


Written in the Stars

by fabulousnothing



Category: BLACKPINK (Band)
Genre: CL and TOP are married with kids idc, F/F, F/M, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Pining, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, au where dalgom kuma and kai don't exist, chaelisa and double b are side, honorable mention to saida namo and seuldy, sounds like a very sad au i'm so sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-11
Updated: 2017-12-11
Packaged: 2019-02-13 09:04:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 26,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12980721
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fabulousnothing/pseuds/fabulousnothing
Summary: Kim Jennie is a lucky girl. She's got a great family, good friends, and a fulfilling job as a tattoo artist.She’s also one of the twenty-five per cent of the population born with a soul mark.She likes her life, but she's waiting for her soul-match. The odds of meeting them aren't great but hey, Jennie’s a lucky girl. She has faith.She can’t believe how good her luck really is when one day her soul-match wanders right into her studio, all flying hair and copper eyes. There’s just one problem: Kim Jisoo is there to get her soul mark covered up. Permanently.





	1. Luck

Kim Jennie is a lucky girl.  
  
She knows this to be true for a lot of reasons. She's lucky to have her chaotic, embarrassing, and utterly devoted family, who tease her and support her and give her a place to belong. When she's in tenth grade there's a fire in the kitchen of their house that her parents manage to escape unharmed, so she has no illusions about exactly how lucky she is to have an aunt that takes them in.  
  
She is fortunate to have (at least so she's been told) ‘pleasing features and sharp eyes’, and combined with her natural body shape this helps her make it through high school relatively unscathed by the cruelties some of the other kids suffer at the hands of their peers.  
  
She's been blessed with a deep passion for music and learns easily, which means she ends up graduating somewhere near the top of her class. She's too much of an introvert to be considered for valedictorian but she's popular enough that she's never lonely, her dance club providing a natural pool of friendship that she dips into when she feels the need. At a dance in her final year she screws up her courage and gives her first kiss to a sweet girl named Nayeon. Luckily, she kisses back.  
  
She works hard to try and deserve all her good fortune. She never misses dance practice, always studies for tests, and brings Nayeon a stuffed bunny for her birthday. She leaves for college in the fall, watching Nayeon through her rear-view mirror as she waves goodbye, bright autumn leaves whirling around her. She’d been accepted to a different institution, so they’d agreed, amicably, to part. Their hearts are both a little bruised, but not broken by any means, and it's very mutual and low-drama. A lot of Jennie’s friends are dealing with painful break-ups or the prospect of unfulfilling long-distance relationships. Not so, for Jennie. She thinks again about how lucky she is as she drives down the freeway, leaving Gwacheon City behind as she speeds into her future.  
  
In college she double majors in Surgical Medicine and Fine Art, because she can also draw. Like, really, really draw.  
  
(She's such a fucking lucky girl.)  
  
Every spare minute not spent on a practice room or watching netflix is spent curled up with her sketchbook and a pencil or some charcoal, spilling the thoughts and feelings that her teenage self still struggles to articulate out onto paper, giving them form and texture and life. It's her catharsis.  
  
Her roommate, a ‘cute and sexy’ girl called Sana who brings home a different girl every week, laughs at her for being a surly, tortured artist, and Jennie rolls her eyes and laughs along, although it couldn't be further from the truth.  
  
She’s not surly; she’s selective.  
  
She's not tortured; she’s waiting.  
  
She waits because there's someone out there who’s right and perfect and _hers_ , and she doesn't want to settle for less.  
  
She knows this because she's among the small percentage of the population born with a soul mark. Her family knows, but she doesn't tell her friends, preferring to cradle the knowledge close to her chest, protecting it, cherishing it. She wants it to be something just she and the person with the matching mark share; something purely theirs.  
  
So she studies and draws and watches tv and reads, and occasionally goes for coffee or drinks with perfectly nice people, but all the while, she waits.  
  
The odds of meeting her soul-match aren't all that great, she knows. A blessed minority of people have marks, so finding the one person out there that’s destined just for you… It seems like it should be impossible. But Jennie just has this feeling. And besides, she's always been so lucky.  
  
She's even lucky to have a mark this beautiful, she thinks. It's become her habit to smooth her fingers over it when she has a moment of privacy, letting herself imagine, after a shower or while she lies in bed at night, how it might feel under the trailing, tender fingertips of her soul-match. The mark has been part of her since birth, a scrunched-up collection of speckles and dots that has unfurled as she's grown and now stretches over the flare of her thigh, right under the juncture where it meets her hip.  
  
For someone like Jennie, to whom conversation doesn't come naturally, having a little piece of her soul right there on her skin feels miraculous, and unexpectedly, heavily intimate.

It's empowering. Addictive.  
  
One day she's out in town, buying a book for a course, when she sees a ‘help wanted’ sign in the window of an unassuming little tattoo studio not too far from campus. She wanders in. It's a bright, white sugar lump of a room, completely stark except for the art on the walls. It's image after image of high quality, hand drawn tattoos, all framed like a gallery. Jennie thinks that’s pretty much exactly what this is. She fills out an application on the spot, and gets the job, despite her middling-to-poor people skills. Lucky, right?  
  
At first she just makes coffee and sterilises equipment and organises little vials of ink, but she loves it. She loves watching people’s stories take shape on their skin, loves the delicacy and the boldness and the complexity of it all. She even likes the dull buzz of the needle, finding it soothes her like white noise, and lets her lose herself in her own mind, so she starts to bring along her sketch book for the quieter periods.  
  
She finds that her soul-mark works its way into all of her doodles and sketches, one way or another. It's not a conscious thing, but she always seems to find echoes of the shape of it in her pieces when she steps back to look at what she's done. The manager of the shop, Kwon Jiyong, is impressed with her work and starts to let her shadow a couple of the other tattooists. The first time Jiyong touches a needle to Jennie, it feels like the instrument has never been more appropriately named as it makes her skin fit her like it never has before. She wants to do that for other people. She comes up with images of ink on skin in her dreams.  
  
As soon as she graduates she becomes a full-time apprentice. She throws herself into it wholeheartedly. After six months, she's certain this is what she's meant to do with her life. Her parents support her, even if they don't exactly get it. It's okay. She wishes she could show them how it feels to bring a little piece of someone's inner self up to their surface. It feels like a privilege. She's so lucky.  
  
Once she's completed her training she quickly acquires a dedicated base of regular customers, all of whom appreciate her eye for detail and laser-focused perfectionism.  
  
She still sketches her soul-mark, over and over, when it's quiet. She's still waiting.  
  
It's a Wednesday when it happens.  
  
It's a nondescript, uneventful Wednesday in March. She's worked out, showered and gone to the studio, grabbing a small bucket of overpriced, over-stewed coffee and an apple on the way. She greets Hanbin, who’s becoming more of a friend than a colegue, as genially as she knows how, and sets her to work scrubbing down the tiny kitchen out back, then she settles in at the front desk. She has half an hour before her first appointment. She downs the last of her coffee and reaches for her pencils.  
  
She flips her sketch pad shut when she hears the door get thrown open, raising an eyebrow when a short, awkward girl stumbles over the threshold and glares briefly back at the doorway like she's mad at it for tripping her.  
  
Jennie gets a glimpse of rolled up sleeves revealing slender, pale forearms, and a general air of anxiety as the girl turns on the spot a few times to take in the studio. She'd put money on this being the girl’s first tattoo.  
  
“Can I help you?” she eventually says, biting back a smirk as the girl visibly startles.  
  
“Jeez,” the girl says, clutching at her plaid-clad chest with unfeasibly long fingers, “Warn a girl!”  
  
“Sorry,” Jennie says flatly, trying to ignore the flare of heat that the sight of those long fingers sparks low in her belly. She deliberately and sarcastically clears her throat, and then says, with as much condescension as she can muster (which is quite a bit, as it happens), “Can I help you?”  
  
The girl’s eyes narrow for a beat, and then her whole face breaks out into a huge smile, which in turn segues into a whole-body laugh. Jennie feels the heat travel from her stomach up to her ears. She presses her thighs together under the desk, willing her cheeks not to flame up as traitorously as her ears. It's been a long time since she's had such a visceral reaction to someone.  
  
The girl moves forward to brace those long hands against Jennie's desk. “Thanks. So helpful. I actually have an appointment in about ten minutes. With, um, Jennie?”  
  
Jennie manages to stop staring at the curve of the bones in the girl’s wrist long enough to stare instead at her coppery eyes, crinkled at the corners with her barely contained laughter. Her mouth feels dry and cottony. “I’m Jennie,” she finally says.  
  
“Awesome,” the girl – Jisoo, according to the appointment book – says. “My friend Limario says you're the best.”  
  
Jennie stares at her blankly.  
  
“Lisa Manoban?” Jisoo qualifies. “You did these badass thai scriptures thingies on her arm a few weeks back? She said your portfolio was pretty sweet.”  
  
“Ah. Yeah, I remember her.” The heat is definitely pinking up Jennie's cheeks now, so she looks down sharply to try to hide it.  
  
“So. This is what I want…” Jisoo pulls a folded piece of paper from her back pocket and slaps it down in the wooden desk right in front of Jennie's nose. Jennie unfolds it gingerly, trying not to think about how the paper is warm because it's holding residual heat from its recent proximity to Jisoo's butt.  
  
“Oh,” she says, surprised by the slightly smudged pencil sketch of a child-like stylised dog that curls across the page in front of her. “Did you draw this?” Most kids nowadays bring along printed images from the internet, or show Jennie a blurry photo on a phone. This is refreshingly old school.  
  
“Yeah.” Pink adorns Jisoo's neck now, in uneven patches. It's stupidly endearing. Jennie's stomach flips at Jisoo's bashful little smile. She feels absurdly hopeful – she's not even sure if this girl is gay or not, but god, she's fucking adorable.  
  
“It's good.”  
  
Jisoo scoffs. “You're too nice.”  
  
“Do you mind if I just…” Jennie gestures to the drawing with a pencil.  
  
“Go for it, please. Just don't change the legs or tail, they need to stay where they are.”  
  
“It's a cover-up?” Jennie can't help her tongue peeking through her lips as she adds to the drawing, sharpening some angles and softening others, changing the shape of the eyes. She doesn't change anything essential about the drawing, but uses her skill to enhance it, to make it more.  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
That’s unexpected; Jennie had honestly thought this kid had never set foot in a tattoo studio in her life before. She takes a few more minutes to move over the drawing with her pencil before she spins the paper back around to show Jisoo, whose eyes go gratifyingly wide.  
  
“Oh,” Jisoo says, much closer than she had been before. She smells dizzyingly of perfume and shampoo and _girl_. “Oh, wow. That looks so good, it's like… What I wanted to draw, but couldn't, you know?” She beams widely, which makes her nose scrunch up. Jennie has to remind herself to keep breathing.  
  
Jennie shakes her head. “You did good. Can I see what you're covering, though? I'll be able to adjust the shading to make sure it's fully hidden.”  
  
“Yeah, no problem.”  
  
Jennie stands to lead Jisoo through to a more private space behind the main reception area, gesturing for Jisoo to sit on a large, pvc-covered bench while she takes a seat on a little wheeled stool and scoots over to a small desk against the wall. She watches out of the corner of her eye as Jisoo hops up on the bench and immediately starts unbuttoning her shirt and yeah, Jennie definitely feels lucky today.  
  
The shirt puddles onto the bench, and Jisoo grips the bottom hem of her t-shirt and yanks it up over her head in a surprisingly fluid movement which does all sorts of good things for the lean musculature of her arms. Jisoo's shoulders are broader than she expected, and covered in beautiful, glowing skin. Jennie wants to draw her. Or draw on her. She can't decide which she wants more, she just wants. She swallows heavily.  
  
“So,” Jisoo says, blissfully unaware of how Jennie watches the tilt of her mouth. “I'm covering up this thing on my back…”  
  
“Okay…” Jennie scoots the stool around to get a clear look, clutching the dog drawing, and bites her lip at the shift of skin and muscle over Jisoo's smooth shoulders contrasting the black laces of her bra, and quickly lowers her gaze, which it turns out is less than helpful because now she's staring at how the small of Jisoo's back dips sweetly just above the curve of her hip. She gulps a little, which is not a thing that she knew she did. She's a professional, for god’s sake.  
  
_Enough_. She shakes her head to get herself in line. She forces herself to flick a purely professional glance over the expanse of skin in front of her. She frowns. She can't see anything to cover here, except a few beauty marks and – oh. She freezes, the drawing fluttering to the floor. There, marked out on Jisoo's shoulder blade, is a perfect replica of Jennie's soul mark. Jennie's jaw drops as she stares at the tiny points of the intricate stars, linked together by fine lines of even tinier, impossibly delicate stars, to form the shape of the Capricorn constellation. Jisoo moves a little and the shading of the mark makes it look like the stars are flickering.  
  
Jennie has seen it thousands of times on herself, but on the canvas of Jisoo's skin it's… overwhelming, like a sucker punch to the chest. It's incredible.  
  
She wants to reach out and touch it, wants to trace it with her fingers. She looks up at the improbably beautiful lines of the woman in front of her, feels the heat of tears prickling behind her eyes. She wants to know her, wants to know how she spends her time and how she thinks and how every part of her tastes. _Fuck. She's so lucky._  
  
She wrestles briefly with what to say. In all the years that she's been waiting for this moment, _dreaming_ of this moment, she's never really figured out the right words. They never were her forte, after all, and she wants it to be... special. She's always found directness works best for her. She probably shouldn't change that now. After all, Jisoo is her soul-match, so she'll probably like Jennie's slightly gruff demeanour, right? She takes a breath and is about to form it into something like ' _By the way, you're beautiful and also you're my soul-match',_ when Jisoo reaches back over her shoulder to waggle a hand towards the pattern on her skin.  
  
“So this, right here? This is what I want you to cover. I want you to make sure you can't see it at all, okay? I want it gone,” she makes a vicious, swiping motion with her hands. “Ixnay on the soul mark crap. I want nothing on my body that I haven't chosen for myself. Taking back control, and stuff. Saying no to predeterminism and all that outdated fandango.”  
  
Jennie blinks, winded.  
  
“And anyway,” Jisoo says, voice becoming wistful and soft, “I"m getting married.”  
  
And that's the moment Kim Jennie will always remember as the moment her luck ran out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ay quick notes here
> 
> This is actually a conversion from a Derek/Stiles fic
> 
> It's one of my favorites ever, and I've been suffering from a drought of jensoo fics lately (thankfully, the real deal is out there being actual girlfriends try not to swoon over their airport pics challenge) so I just thought "hey why not read that one and pretend it's jensoo" and it was a reach at first, but then it started to fit really well so I thought "okay I think I might be onto something" and now we're here
> 
> I have the author's permission and I changed a few things for it to fit the best it could, but yall should read the original too, you won't regret it :)
> 
> http://archiveofourown.org/works/11600508
> 
> Also, if you just landed here from parachutes you should stan BLACKPINK, I swear it's worth it (they have a tv show planned to air this month and are supposedly having a comeback in January so YAY)
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> (but it's YG so who knows)


	2. Yuanfen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yuanfen: a Chinese concept that doesn't fully translate into English, concerning the fate or chance by which two people are brought together, a combination of serendipity and destiny; the binding force that connects people in any type of relationship.

“Um. Congratulations,” Jennie manages numbly, grateful for once for her natural taciturnity as it stops her from feeling the need to force out anything more expressive that might give her away.  
  
“Thanks. I mean I haven't actually asked her yet, so you maybe oughtta save that for when it's official.” Jisoo grins back over her bare shoulder.  
  
Jennie's heart, which had stopped at the words ‘I'm getting married’, pumps back into action, throwing itself urgently against her ribcage. _Now_ , the rush of her blood whispers in her ears. _Tell her now_. _There's still a chance_. Her head is spinning and she feels, for the very first time in her life, like she might pass out. She regrets sitting on this stupid little stool; there's nothing to hold onto, nothing nearby to ground herself with except Jisoo, and the last thing in the world she wants to do is grab onto this girl who has unknowingly, and with the most guileless of smiles, upended Jennie's entire future. She tries and fails to marshal her thoughts into some sort of coherency.  
  
Jisoo twists around a little, perching at an angle so she can see Jennie's face. Her forehead creases a little. She must interpret Jennie's blank stare as curiosity rather than horror, because she plunges on blithely.  
  
“I know, I know. But we live together so it's basically a done deal. Been together since we were in high school and we were both on the debate team.” Jisoo moves her hands around enthusiastically as she talks, and they look like white birds fluttering in Jennie's peripheral vision. Like doves, only they're bringing chaos, not peace. “Actually we met when we were paired up to present the opposing argument in a debate about whether there was any merit to the beliefs and notions surrounding the soul-mark tradition. Not a hardship for me, even then…” Jisoo's voice turns flinty, and Jennie wonders what could have happened to her to put her off the idea so much. Jisoo clears her throat. “Anyway. She was fucking magnificent. Smartest person I've ever met, hands down. Our eyes met above the heads of our crushed and weeping opposition and we've been together ever since.”  
  
Jennie is used to clients pouring their hearts out to her while they sit on this plastic-covered bench, explaining how all the threads of their personal histories end up weaving together to form the image Jennie etches onto their skin. Sitting here listening to Jisoo feels both achingly familiar and wildly different.  
  
Her heart pounds like a jackhammer in her chest, beating out _tell her, tell her, tell her_ , over and over, relentless, but her head holds her back. Would it really make any difference? The girl is clearly opposed to the notion of soul-matches on the deepest of levels, and has been for years. She's spent her past denouncing everything to do with it, her present ridding herself of it, and soon she'll commit the rest of her future to someone else. What could Jennie possibly say that would change the way Jisoo feels? She's just Jennie, after all. Jisoo would let her down gently, she's sure, but what would be the point of putting them both through the inevitable painful awkwardness of it?  
  
Also, she supposes, if she herself still believes in soul-matches – and she does now, having met Jisoo, more than ever – surely she's supposed to want whatever makes her match the happiest. It seems like so much more than a coincidence that it's Jennie's hands that Jisoo has sought out to cover the mark that links them. If her whole purpose is to make Jisoo happy, well… Maybe the way she does that is to follow through with Jisoo's wishes.  
  
It doesn't do anything to alleviate the sick disappointment that squats heavy in her chest.  
  
The tips of Jennie's ears burn ferociously. She bends to grab the fallen drawing, grateful for the way the movement muffles her voice and obscures the tone. “So you're really… not into the whole soul match thing?”  
  
Jisoo scoffs. “Understatement of the century. I mean, each to their own, and all that. But the idea that some mysterious force has chosen someone for me that I'm expected to love regardless of who they are? Nuh uh. Not for me. Never did like being told what to do…” she lights up with a mischievous smile.  
  
Jennie makes a noncommittal noise in her throat that seems to satisfy Jisoo. Muscle memory takes over and on auto-pilot she holds the dog sketch up against Jisoo's soul mark, checking the size and shading, even as she wonders how she could even be considering this. She hopes there’ll be a reason the tattoo won't work at all, but of course it's the perfect size and shape.  
  
“So, what's the verdict?”  
  
“It's…” Jennie clears her throat to dislodge the words that stick there. “Yeah. It'll work.”  
  
“Excellent.” Jisoo starts to tug her t-shirt back on over her head. “So when do I need to come back to get inked, tatt-man?”  
  
Jennie blinks at her. “Tatt-man?”  
  
“Yeah,” Jisoo pulls another rubber-faced grin that shouldn't really be as attractive as it is and nods at Jennie's painfully expressionless face. “You totally have that whole night-stalking, crime-fighting, angry-eyebrowed vigilante thing going on.” Jennie frowns but Jisoo just laughs. “Way to disprove my point, eyebrows.”  
  
Jennie glares at her. “Firstly, if I were a superhero, I'd obviously be Wonder Woman-”  
  
“Aham, sure,” Jisoo looks her over far too shrewdly and it makes Jennie's stomach twist. “What color is your car?”  
  
Jennie glares harder.  
  
“It's black isn't it?” Jisoo lets out a little crow of triumph at the look on Jennie's face. “Knew it! You own a tatt-mobile, admit it.”  
  
Jennie huffs and scoots the stool away. “I’ll check the appointment book but it'll be a few weeks, I think I'm booked through the middle of April.” Enough time for Jisoo to change her mind, maybe, or for Jennie to come to terms with it.  
  
“Alright.” Jisoo shrugs her shirt up over her shoulders. “Should I give you my digits or do I just look for your signal in the sky?”  
  
Jennie opens her mouth to bite out a snarky response, surprised by how much she likes bickering with this obnoxiously endearing girl. It's familiar somehow, and bittersweet, like pressing on a bruise.  
  
“Yo, Jennie,” Hanbin sticks his head around the partition. “Yongguk just called to cancel his Saturday afternoon appointment. Sick with the flu or something. You want to take it off?”  
  
_Oh no_. Jennie's heart sinks.  
  
“Or…” Jisoo sidles over and nudges her shoulder with her own, “You could tattoo your new bff slash sidekick Jisoo?”  
  
"I don't, uh…" Jennie lets her eyes dart around the room, searching desperately for a reason to refuse.  
  
"I promise not to make any more tatt-man jokes…" Jisoo looks up at Jennie through her eyelashes and Jennie realises she doesn't stand a chance.  
  
"Okay. Yeah. Can you book her in, B.I? I just gotta… Um, see ya, Jisoo." She ducks through the studio and out of the door that leads into the alleyway that runs down the side of the shop, sucking in deep lungfuls of stagnant, damp air. She sinks down onto her haunches and rests her head in her hands. She's been dreaming about this happening every night for years, and now she feels all those dreams slipping away, like grains of sand pouring through her fingers. What the fuck is she going to do?  
  
She forces herself to her feet and heads for the second-hand book store a couple of blocks away. She’ll get a cup of tea in the little café at the back, she thinks, and lose herself in another world for a while. Her chest loosens in relief as she pushes through the door and the warm scent of coffee and imagination and possibility envelops her. She's never been much of a book worm, but she's loved this place since she moved here to start college, and was first lured in by the vanilla-almond sweetness of old paper. It soothes her on some fundamental level. She goes straight to the display of the latest titles they've had delivered, running her fingers reverently over the cracked spines and slightly dog eared pages.  
  
She stops, dead still, as one of the books catches her eye.  
  
She knows it from high school but hasn't read it in years. The cover is simple; a photograph of a sunset, or a sunrise, depending on how you want to look at it. It feels more like a sunset, right now. The title below is in plain, unpretentious font: There Are Men Too Gentle To Live Among Wolves.  
  
She lets the book fall open. She knows where it will land before she even touches it, and with a sinking inevitability she reads the first line of the poem.  
  
_‘To love is not to possess.’_  
  
She inhales, sharply. In this moment, she has to make a choice; she can either be weirded out by the strange sense of fate that seems to have brought her here, or she can believe in it.  
  
She chooses to believe in it.  
  
She buys the book and some hot tea. By the time she gets back to the studio, Jisoo is long gone.  
  
She hardly sleeps at all until Saturday. She knows what she has to do, but it doesn't make it hurt any less when Jisoo walks through the door, excited and happy, and every bit as dorky and weird and beautiful as she remembers. She recites the poem to herself, over and over, as she asks Jisoo to straddle a tall chair backwards and rest her chest against the back. She applies the transfer paper to Jisoo and sees for the first time how her shoulder-blade will look without the soul mark.  
  
_‘To love is not to possess,_  
_To own or imprison…’_  
  
She focuses intently on the few square inches of skin in front of her. She can't look at any other part of Jisoo or she won't be able to do it. She knows she could refuse, that Jisoo would find another tattooist and that would be the end of it. But somehow it feels right that she's the one replacing the mark with another, that by indelibly marking Jisoo some other way with her own hands, maybe they're still linked in some way. At the very least she can make sure it's beautiful.  
  
She takes a deep breath. She can do this. She can do this for Jisoo.  
  
_‘To love is not to possess.’_  
  
She switches on the needle and erases herself from Jisoo's skin.  
  
*  
  
Afterwards, Jisoo wants to take her for chicken wings because she feels bad for nearly passing out twice.  
  
Jennie feels pretty shaky herself, although she's doing her best not to let Jisoo see that, but she feels a wave of hot guilt course through her at the thought of spending further time with Jisoo. Then she thinks of the way the ink had covered over the last traces of the soul mark that matches her own, the one she'll never touch with her bare fingertips, and she thinks she can allow herself one final hour with the girl who'll never touch her mark either. She relents.  
  
She's regretting it a little, to be honest. She hadn't thought it was possible for anyone to eat chicken wings sexily, and objectively, Jisoo eating chicken wings really isn't, but still…  
  
She clears her throat and glares down at her own wings so she doesn't have to watch Jisoo lick at her own fingers or chase the straw around her glass with her tongue.  
  
Jisoo is unphased by her quiet companion, talking animatedly about her passions (her job as a writer and soon to be published author, spicy food, Overwatch, and Seulgi), and her plans for proposing, which all sound grandiose and strange to Jennie's ears. She nods dutifully along, but she's grateful when Jisoo moves on to wax lyrical about the wings, how much she loves the dog that now curls across her shoulder, and how she'll recommend Jennie to her friends. Jennie chuffs and shrugs and scuffs at the floor and wills the wings to last forever.  
  
Jisoo slurps down the last of her soda and sits back in her chair with a satisfied little sigh, regarding Jennie with sharp, amused eyes. "So what are you doing tonight?"  
  
*  
  
Several hours later, Jennie meets her near the front of a slightly dingy club that Jisoo says she regularly frequents with a group of friends. She's gathered reinforcements in the form of Sana and Hanbin so at least Jisoo won't be the only person she knows there, but her heart still hammers in nervous anticipation. She doesn't really know why she's doing this, only that she seems to have exhausted her reserve of self-restraint where Jisoo is concerned, and so she'd accepted the invitation as soon as it was offered.  
  
Jisoo seems pleased to see her, slinging an arm around her shoulders to introduce her to the group she's with. Jennie tries to ignore the line of heat from Jisoo's body, focusing instead on remembering names. She recognises Lisa right away and is pleased to see the fresh, dark bands of ink around her arm are fully healed. She's there with her girlfriend Chaeyoung, and a couple of guys she introduces as ‘Ten’ and ‘Bambam’.  
  
Once they get inside the club, they make their way to the bar, where a girl waits with a tall guy who looks like he'd rather be anywhere else in the world. "Yo, Jisoo, you get yourself a bodyguard?"  
  
Jisoo calmly shrugs him off as he orders several drinks and leads them to a free table. "That’s Bobby." She has to lean close and yell to be heard over the music, her breath ghosting hotly over the shell of Jennie's ear.  
  
Jennie nods to hide the shiver that runs over her skin. "And your girlfriend?"  
  
"Nah, Seulgi’s at home, working on her thesis. That’s Dahyun. She's awesome. And single, if you're interested?" Jisoo waggles her eyebrows teasingly.  
  
Jennie shakes her head. "Not really looking right now." She looks for Sana and Hanbin but she's already lost them in the crowd.  
  
"Hey, Jennie, how’s it going?" Lisa appears behind them and clasps Jennie's hand before pulling her in for a complicated hug that Jennie barely keeps up with. "Jisoo, you're needed on the dance floor. The guys are a car wreck out there, it's painful to watch."  
  
"Alright, alright, I'm on my way. Wanna dance, Jennie?"  
  
"No thanks." Jennie actually just wants to find a dark, quiet place to hide in until this whole mess goes away. Instead she sips slowly at a beer, and tries not to look obvious as she watches Jisoo throw her body around the dance floor. Like almost everything about Jisoo, the disjointed, erratic movements should not be sexy, but somehow they are. Something about the way they seem to be born of a buoyant inner joy, probably. Jennie notices wryly that she's not the only one who thinks so, as several people seem to gather closer and closer to dance, moths to the flame of Jisoo's energy. It attracts Jennie the same way, only she's already been burned. She shakes her head when Jisoo tries to wave her over. She’ll keep her distance.  
  
After several songs, Lisa breaks away from the fray and comes to lean next to Jennie, gulping down half a beer in one go. She follows Jennie's incredulous eye-line. "She's really something, huh?"  
  
Jennie shakes her head in gentle disbelief. "What the hell am I watching?"  
  
Lisa snorts. "Crazy, right? But everyone loves her. Though I think it's only like this ‘cos she's taken so she's not handsy or anything. If she actually wanted to get anyone she’d totally wipe out, you know?"  
  
Lisa’s right. Jisoo smiles at the approaching boys, and gets into silly dance-offs with the girls, but she's always careful not to touch them. "She’s never tempted?"  
  
"Nah. Loyal as a puppy. Plus Seulgi’s smokin’, so."  
  
"Ah." Jennie bites down on the inside of her cheek. The music is starting to give her a grating headache, right at the back of her skull. She's tired from lack of sleep and from the alcohol, and she really doesn't need to hear about how hot Seulgi is, but she can't seem to bring herself to walk away.  
  
Chaeyoung must motion to Lisa because she slips back into the throng of swaying bodies, but Jennie isn't left alone in her awkwardness for long because Jisoo ducks out from the circle and makes her way over to fling herself down into the chair next to her, chest heaving from her exertions.  
  
"Good choice of friends!" Jisoo nods over to the bar where Sana and Dahyun are whispering together, and Jennie notes with some surprise that Bobby and Hanbin have found a shadowy corner and are all over each other. "You've officially paired off the two biggest pains in my ass, I owe you forever." Jisoo raises a bottle to Jennie in thanks. "You're never getting rid of us now, you know that, right, Tatt-man?"  
  
Jennie rolls her eyes theatrically, but later, in the dark, when she sinks into her cool bed-sheets, she remembers the hint of affection that had warmed Jisoo's gaze, and admits to herself that she's absurdly pleased.  
  
*  
  
Over the next few weeks, Jisoo makes good on her words and Jennie finds herself being dragged out to dinner or the movies or a club, with some variation on Jisoo's group of friends (although never Seulgi, Jennie notices), at least once a week. It's actually nice, other than a persistent, yearning ache in her chest whenever she gets too close to Jisoo. She ignores it, firmly. Once the group figures out that Jennie's loft is bigger and more private than any of their own apartments, they begin to show up regularly on Friday nights, with soda and pizza. Jennie does a pretty good job, on the whole, of not letting on how much she loves it, even if Jisoo does insist on calling her loft the Tatt-Cave.  
  
She also thinks she does a pretty good job of not letting on that she's hopelessly in love with Jisoo, although Sana shoots her a keen-eyed look when Jennie goes right out to buy a Nintendo after seeing the look on Jisoo's face when she discovers Jennie doesn't have any video games.  
  
Jennie just wants Jisoo to have a reason to keep coming back to her apartment. It feels right to have her in her space.  
  
It’s not like it can go on forever, anyway, even if it is serendipity or fate that brought them together. The date Jisoo is planning on proposing is coming up, and then she'll be caught up in wedding planning, and once she's married she'll be off… doing married things Jennie can't bring herself to think about. All Jennie will have is the echo of her voice around the loft and a soul mark that doesn't mean anything anymore. She just wants to enjoy the little bit of Jisoo she can have, while it lasts.  
  
She knows Jisoo wants to propose to Seulgi on their seventh anniversary, and that she's planned a fancy dinner at a very expensive restaurant, with crystal and champagne and a whole bunch of other stuff that doesn't seem very Jisoo-like at all, but is, as Jisoo would say, 'Seulgi’s jam'. Jisoo produces the ring, shyly, to a chorus of excited coos from everyone except Lisa, who wrinkles her nose and pretends she has to squint to see the diamond. The teasing just bounces off Jisoo, who is effervescing with excitement as she counts down the days and the hours and the minutes until she can give the ring to Seulgi.  
  
Every tick of the clock weighs heavy on Jennie's shoulders.  
  
Eventually, inevitably, the day arrives. Jennie sleeps fitfully the night before, and wakes up drained. She's made sure she doesn't have any appointments because she can't be this distracted when she's working. Instead she goes for a long walk and comes home via the bookstore. She marathons several episodes of a show she didn't bother to read the title, until the shadows grow long on the walls. She thinks about calling her mom, but she doesn't want her to notice anything’s wrong. Instead she waits, alone, as her soul-match proposes to someone else. She has no choice, because it's the right thing to do even if it doesn't feel like it. Sometimes she really hates being a good girl.  
  
_To love is not to possess._  
  
Her own loss and her jealousy don't matter. The most important thing is Jisoo's happiness.  
  
She makes coffee and stares at it until it goes cold, then she makes another and does the same. She pours away four cups before she gives up on coffee. It's the longest day of her life.  
  
Once the daylight fades completely she orders Chinese food, not because she's especially hungry but just because she feels like she should. She paces for a while and then sits on the sofa to try and read, but the words of her manga swim muzzily with the drawings in front of her. Eventually she settles on sketching, setting some of her frustration free in rough, angry swipes of the charcoal.  
  
A knock on the door startles the charcoal from her hand. "Shit." It's probably her food.  
  
She yanks open the door, taking a step backwards in surprise when she finds Jisoo huddled in the doorway. She can tell immediately that something is very wrong. Jisoo is hunched into herself, hands shoved deep inside her pockets. Her hair is sticking up all over the place like she's been wringing her hands through it. Jennie's stomach plummets.  
  
"Jisoo?" Jennie tries to make her voice low and soft and soothing.  
  
"She said no." Jisoo mumbles. She shuffles to the side to reveal a battered holdall. "She broke up with me. I just, uh…" she blinks up and around her, chewing on her lower lip, looking vaguely confused as to why she's at Jennie's loft. "I guess I don't know where else to go…"  
  
Her eyes are huge and bloodshot, her voice rough. Jennie's heart breaks for her. She’d never wanted Jisoo to be unhappy. She takes her by the shoulder. "I’m glad you came here. I- For as long as you want, okay?" She grabs the bag and steers Jisoo gently through the apartment, settling her on the couch.  
  
"Thanks." Jisoo is barely audible now, and is visibly shivering. Jennie bends to slip Jisoo's sneakers off her feet, and grabs the blanket from the arm of the sofa, tucking it around her. Jisoo sinks back into the cushions, clutching the blanket into herself.  
  
"Do you need anything? A drink?"  
  
Jisoo shakes her head. "Just her."  
  
"I'm sorry." Jennie finds she genuinely means it.  
  
"She said... she's been thinking about breaking up for a long time now. She wants to focus on her thesis and to, to..." Jisoo voice breaks into a little hiccupy sob, "to find herself."  
  
Jennie is swept through with the urge to hold her, but she doesn't, she can't, and it's fucking awful. Instead she lays a careful hand on the socked foot that sticks out from beneath the blanket. She doesn't say anything. There's nothing to say. The foot starts to shake and she can tell Jisoo is crying so she holds it just a little bit tighter, passing the box of tissues to Jisoo with her free hand. It disappears into the swathe of blanket, and there's the sound of Jisoo shakily blowing her nose.  
  
After a long time, the shaking stills. Another knock at the door signifies the arrival of the food. By the time Jennie is back with two steaming bowls of beef and broccoli and Singapore noodles, Jisoo is fast asleep.  
  
Jennie puts the food down and takes a long look at the little bit of Jisoo she can see - just a pale cheekbone, framed with thick eyelashes and the start of the swoop of her nose, and she feels helpless and heart-sore. She wishes she could somehow take Jisoo's pain away, even if it meant she felt it instead. She's a little angry with the world, because the whole point of Jennie suffering through a broken heart is so that Jisoo doesn't have to. Jisoo is supposed to be happy. That was the plan, fuck-you-very-much, Universe.  
  
Jisoo makes a snuffly noise and shifts a little in her sleep. Jennie wonders what it means that Jisoo came here instead of Lisa’s. It doesn't really matter why, she decides. Jisoo is here now. For better or for worse.


	3. Faith

Jennie pauses outside Jisoo's room – the guest room, really, but over the last three or four weeks she’s already come to think of it as Jisoo's room – and presses her palm to the door. Inside she knows Jisoo is in bed, even though it’s the middle of the afternoon. Seulgi’s rejection has hit Jisoo like a body blow, sending her crumpling into bed where she’s stayed, sleeping all day and barely eating. Thank god she had already-written articles piled up and ready to send, and Jennie has managed to lay off her publisher's pressure for now.  
  
A steady stream of visitors arrives for her; first Lisa, then Chaeyoung, then Bobby with Hanbin in tow, and then Lisa again, but Jisoo sends them all away. Jennie doesn’t really know what to do other than try the best she can to take care of her, bringing her fresh juice and clearing away plates of untouched food. She tries to draw Jisoo's focus away from her cell (which she stares at intensely although Seulgi never calls) and into conversation, but stumbles over the listless monosyllables that seem to be all Jisoo can muster. She surreptitiously changes the bedding every few days when Jisoo is in the bathroom, but it’s been almost a week since Jisoo managed to shower and Jennie knows she needs to try a different approach.  
  
She hates how Jisoo is hurting, hates watching her fade away. She needs to figure something out.  
  
She goes to her own bathroom and fills the deep, claw-foot tub with warm water and bubbles, and then she goes to Jisoo's room where she enters without knocking. Jisoo is, as expected, staring hopelessly at the ceiling from the life-raft of the bed. Her loud squawk of protest as Jennie pulls the cover back and bodily scoops her up is the most noise Jennie has heard her make in days. “Jennie! What the hell?”  
  
She’s too thin, Jennie can tell, her hair is starting to get matted and her eyes are underscored with purpling, bruise-like shadows. She looks terrible.  
  
“You look terrible,” Jennie says helpfully, as she kicks open Jisoo's bedroom door and heads for the bathroom.  
  
Jisoo's mouth drops open in shock, eyes widening as she sees the bath already drawn.  
  
She struggles and pounds in Jennie’s hold inefficiently. “Don’t you dare, Kim Jennie! Put me down, you oaf!”  
  
Jennie does, unceremoniously dumping her into the bathtub, pajamas and all. She points to the shampoo, bodywash and razor that line the bathtub and says, “Wash. There’s food when you’re ready.”  
  
“Holy shit!” Jisoo splutters in shock, looking at her hands which are dripping bubbles. “You actually…” her face darkens and she glares daggers at Jennie. “You will rue the day, Kim!”  
  
Jennie rolls her eyes and steps out of the room, closing the door firmly behind her. She can’t help a tiny smile at the memory of Jisoo's outraged, gaping face as she sploshed into the water. It’s fine if Jisoo is mad at her; anything is better than the apathy of the last few weeks. If it takes being kind of an asshole to get Jisoo to surface from the place she’s retreated to, deep within herself, then that’s what Jennie will do.  
  
She opens the fridge and surveys the contents.  
  
Her mom always used to cook for her and her cousin when they were ill, and she supposes heart-sickness is the same sort of thing. She doesn’t know what Jisoo's mom used to make for her when she needed comfort as a child, so she settles on her own mom’s go-to recipe; chicken noodle soup.  
  
Jisoo emerges from the bathroom an hour later in the fresh sweats Jennie laid out for her, clean skin glowing pink. She smells like Jennie’s shampoo. Jennie swallows hard and tries to breathe through her mouth.  
  
She gestures to the table where she’s laid out a steaming bowl of soup and several slices of thickly buttered bread. “Eat.” she turns back to the tv, trying not to make a big deal of Jisoo eating in case it scares her off like a skittish animal.  
  
She’s immensely relieved when Jisoo crosses the kitchen and sits at the table. She grabs a spoonful and shoves it into her mouth. Jennie carefully doesn’t watch her. ”Just because this is really, really good,” Jisoo mutters around the spoon, almost inaudibly over the netflix movie. “Does not mean you’re forgiven.”  
  
Jennie shrugs. “Okay.”  
  
She watches in silence while Jisoo eats. The bath seems to have awoken her enough to eat almost a whole bowl, and one of the slices of bread.  
  
As soon as the spoon hits the side of the bowl, Jennie gets to her feet and grabs her keys, shoving Jisoo's sneakers towards her. “Come on.”  
  
Jisoo's face is comically furious. “Not a chance. I've suffered a traumatic event! Some dickwad threw me in a bath, remember? I’m going back to bed to recover.” She lifts her chin and crosses her arms across her chest stubbornly.  
  
Jennie shakes her head. “Nope. Do I need to carry you again? Because I will.” She takes a step towards Jisoo.  
  
“No!” Jisoo shoots to her feet. “No. I’m coming, jeez.” She shoves her feet into her shoes and trudges after Jennie.  
  
She sulks all the way to the car, not even making a Batmobile joke when she sees Jennie’s black Porsche. Instead she puts her feet up on the dash, daring Jennie to say something. When she’s met with Jennie’s silence, she wraps her arms around her knees, frowning out at the buildings as they flash by. She rouses a little when the car draws to a stop, making a small noise of confusion when she sees where Jennie has brought them.  
  
“Sports centre?”  
  
“I thought you might wanna hit stuff with a bat.”  
  
Jisoo turns to stare at her. “Huh.”  
  
She allows herself to be led through the parking lot, her semi-catatonia earning them some curious glances from the guy who hooks them up with bats and tokens. She only seems to come back to herself when she’s standing on the mat inside the netted off batting cage next to Jennie’s, bat in hand.  
  
Jisoo stares at the bat like she’s never seen one before. “I don’t know about this, Jennie…” she moves the weight of it from one hand to the other.  
  
Jennie shrugs. “Get ready to have your ass kicked then.” She turns her cap backwards and holds her own bat up over her shoulder, pivoting her foot when she hears the sound of the ball leaving the pitching machine.

She misses it, but Jisoo is too dreary to notice, swinging half-heartedly and missing her own ball by a mile.  
  
“Come on, Jasmine girl, show me what you got!” She pulls off her hoodie to reveal a Little Mermaid shirt her dad bought her on a work trip, when she was a kid. It’s uncomfortably childish, a little too tight now, and it smells kinda weird after languishing in a drawer for years, but Jennie needs to bring out the big guns if she really wants to piss Jisoo off. She turns slightly and deliberately, so that Ariel is right in Jisoo's line of sight.  
  
“Oh my god,” Jisoo mutters, glaring over at the shirt. “You suck _so much_.” But there’s a flicker of life in her eyes, and a thread of steel in her voice, and this time when she swings the bat, it connects with the ball hard enough that it flies off into the netting.  
  
Jennie’s long gone luck seems to make a comeback as she hits the next ball dead on, and turns to Jisoo with a challenging smirk. She feels a flare of triumph when Jisoo's eyes narrow in determination, a little glimpse of Jisoo's familiar fire. She raises an eyebrow because she knows it will annoy Jisoo even more. She wants her to keep feeling that anger, to tap into it, and then to let it out.  
  
Jisoo hits the next ball, and the next, and the next, and soon she’s completely focused on it, not noticing when Jennie pulls her hoodie back and stops feeding tokens to her own machine so that Jisoo can have more turns. She smacks the balls harder and harder, the force of it punching raw, animal sounds out of her chest until eventually she's meeting each ball with a howl of hurt, or rage, or frustration, or all three. Jisoo's face is wet with sweat or tears, Jennie doesn’t know which, and she doesn’t ask. She sits quietly in the corner of the cage, watching as Jisoo's muscles tense, bunch and release over and over. She hopes she hasn’t gone too far, pushing Jisoo into this.  
  
Jisoo only stops when she’s spent and shaking, collapsing down to sprawl out next to Jennie. She’s pale with exhaustion, but her eyes are alight. The knot of worry in Jennie’s chest loosens just a little.  
  
They sit for a long time, listening to the whirr of the machines and the faint thwack of bats on balls as Jisoo’s panting slows down. Eventually Jennie rolls her head towards Jisoo. “You okay?”  
  
“Yeah.” Jisoo exhales slowly through her nose. She sounds tired, but not empty like before. “Hey, Jennie?”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Let’s go home.”  
  
Warmth floods Jennie’s chest. “Okay.”  
  
*  
  
Things slowly change, after that. Jisoo appears for breakfast the next morning, dressed in soft, comfortable clothes, and though she spends the day on the sofa and still compulsively stares at her phone, she at least doesn’t retreat back to bed.  
  
There are days where Jisoo does stay in bed, days where she’s still too overcome with loss to function, and Jennie doesn’t ever push her because she knows the next day, or the day after that, it will be a little better again, because Jisoo is coming back to herself – coming back to Jennie. It’s going to be a long journey, Jennie thinks, but Jisoo has taken the first steps.  
  
A few days after the batting cages, Jisoo lets Lisa come over for the first time, and they spend hours on the living room, playing video games and wrestling and talking. Jennie strategically retreats to her own room to let them talk. When Lisa leaves, Jisoo looks tired and drawn, but somehow more settled in her own skin.  
  
Gradually Jisoo spends more and more time with her friends, letting them gather close to her, letting them love her.  
  
“So are you living here now, like, permanently?” Chaeyoung asks curiously one night, as she and Jennie build dinner from the assortment of food spread over the coffee table.  
  
Jisoo's eyes flick straight over to Jennie. They haven’t actually had this conversation yet, there’s just an unspoken understanding that this is where Jisoo is, now.  
  
“For as long as she’ll have me,” Jisoo says at exactly the same moment Jennie says “For as long as she wants,” and they both laugh and do a carrot toast, and that’s that.  
  
Jisoo starts to eat more regularly, and Jennie often comes home from the studio to find Jisoo trying to cook for them both, barefoot and perfect. At first Jennie thinks it's an attempt at distraction before she comes to realise Jisoo is really just trying to cook, so she helps her. Its achingly domestic. She shoves the thought away. It doesn’t matter how she feels, as long as Jisoo is getting better.  
  
Jennie knows she’s on the right track when Jisoo returns from the laundry room one evening and drapes herself over the back of the couch where Jennie is rewatching Stranger Things, eyes glittering with mirth. She looks so much like her old self. It makes Jennie’s breath catch in her throat.  
  
Jennie narrows her eyes. “Why do you look like you’re up to no good...?”  
  
Jisoo gasps dramatically and clutches her hand to her chest. “You wound me, Jennie! I’ll have you know I’m actually doing a nice thing because I am a selfless and thoughtful roommate.”  
  
Jennie sighs in resignation. “What did you do, Jisoo?”  
  
Jisoo smirks. “Your laundry.”  
  
“Okay…” Jennie frowns. “Thanks, I guess.”  
  
“But, hmm, I wonder if it’s possible your laundry somehow got mixed up with someone else’s?” Jisoo's voice is silky and dangerous, her lips curved into a knowing smile.  
  
Jennie’s stomach does a weird little flip as she racks her brain for any potentially embarrassing items of clothing Jisoo might have come across. She’s been the freaked-out recipient of sexy underwear from ex-partners, but she’d always shoved it in the trash at the earliest opportunity so it can’t be that…  
  
“I only wonder because I’m sure human Gucci Kim Jennie would never in a million years own these, am I right?”  
  
Jisoo holds something up in front of her and Jennie’s heart stops. _Oh no. Oh no, no, no._ The pajamas her Mom bought her for Christmas her first year in college… The bright blue pants, covered in dancing cartoon pretzels, had been meant as a joke, but they’d turned out to be the most comfortable things she’d ever worn in her life. She hadn’t worn them much lately, what with Jisoo being around, but she’d given in to the urge the other night when Jisoo had gone to bed early. She’s regretting her moment of indulgence, now…  
  
She looks from the pajamas to Jisoo, who is barely containing a Cheshire-cat grin. If she shows weakness right now Jisoo will never let her live it down, so she decides to do the only thing she can; style it out.  
  
She shrugs nonchalantly then looks back at the tv. “No, they’re mine. They’re really soft and they fit my butt great.”  
  
Jisoo snorts in surprised amusement. “Nice. Do you think Batman has secret comfy-butt pjs? Maybe that’s why he lived alone until he found Robin, the only roommate in the world who owned more embarrassing clothing than he did. Sadly for you, I barely own any spandex so you are officially the more embarrassing roommate.”  
  
Jennie huffs, ears burning at the superhuman effort it takes not to think about Jisoo in spandex. “You’re ridiculous.”  
  
“Your butt is ridiculous. What are you, half Kardashian? Not surprised you wanna keep these if they accommodate the booty. You should never let them go.”  
  
Jennie can’t help her jaw from falling open at Jisoo's admission that she’s been looking at her butt, even objectively, and Jisoo grins in triumph at having broken Jennie’s cool composure. She throws the pajamas at Jennie’s face as she skips away in the direction of her room.  
  
“I hate you!” Jennie calls out after her.  
  
“No, you don’t!” Comes Jisoo's smug reply.  
  
“Get out of my house!”  
  
“Never leaving!” Jisoo sing-songs back as she shuts her door.  
  
Jennie sits for a minute, fingers curled around the brushed cotton of the pyjama pants, before she catches sight of her dopey grin reflecting on the television and shakes her stupid self out of it.  
  
*  
  
One weekend Jisoo goes with Lisa to collect her stuff from the apartment she shared with Seulgi, and on her return heads straight to her room.  
  
“It was tough on her,” Lisa says, fringe-covered forehead creased in concern. She waits with Jennie for a couple of hours but Jisoo doesn’t re-emerge, so she leaves Jennie with a large suitcase, several cardboard boxes, and a sympathetic smile.  
  
A little later Jennie hears Jisoo's door open, and soft footsteps pad to Jennie’s room. After a few minutes, the footsteps haven’t returned, so she curiously goes to see what’s happening. She catches Jisoo standing in the middle of her room, looking guilty. Jennie cocks an eyebrow when she sees that she’s wearing the pretzel pajama pants. Jisoo raises her chin defiantly. “Don’t judge me.”  
  
Jennie shakes her head. “If loving those pants is wrong, I don’t want to be right.”  
  
Jisoo looks at the floor, a small smile on her face.  
  
“You want a drink?”  
  
“God, yes.” Jisoo sighs in relief.  
  
They sit on either end of the couch with a cup of hot chocolate each, and Jisoo finally talks. She tells Jennie how Seulgi had been there, in the apartment, along with some girl called Seungwan who she’d introduced as a friend but had looked at like she was more. Jisoo hadn’t realised, she says, how long it had been since she’d looked at her that way.  
  
She talks about how things with Seulgi had been strained for several months before the break up, with work pressures forcing them to spend more time apart. When Jisoo had proposed, Seulgi had seen their future stretched before them and panicked, because she’d never really considered any other options. She’d said she didn’t know who she was without Jisoo but she wanted to find out.  
  
The problem was that Jisoo didn’t know who she was without Seulgi, either. She didn’t know if, without Seulgi, she was anything at all.  
  
Jennie wants to tell her that she’s everything, that she’s absolutely, perfectly everything, just sitting there in pretzel pajama pants, with unbrushed hair and bare toes. But she doesn’t.  
  
“Hey, can I ask you something?” Jisoo asks suddenly.  
  
“Sure.”  
  
“Why don’t you date? Is it because of me?”  
  
Jennie’s eyes widen and her heart picks up. She’s been so careful not to let Jisoo know how she really feels, how could Jisoo possibly know? “What?”  
  
Jisoo tilts her head to the side. “You know, ‘cos I’ve been such a mess. I thought maybe you were trying to be all sensitive and not flaunt some secret perfect boyfriend… or girlfriend?... in my face in case it reinforced to me how incredibly pathetic my own love life currently is.”  
  
“Oh.” Jennie looks down at the mug in her hands, relief trickling down her spine like the condensation down the cup. “No. No boyfriend or girlfriend.”  
  
“How come? Tell me to butt out if you want, but you don’t seem to be exactly playing the field either and hello, I would if I looked like you.”  
  
“No. I mean here and there, but,” Jennie takes a deep breath. She’s never told anyone about her soul mark before, but she wants Jisoo to know who she is. “I have a soul mark. I guess I’m still trying to figure out what that means for me.”  
  
Jisoo nods slowly. “Okay. I just wanted to make sure that you know that I’m totally fine with you dating. It wouldn’t, like, upset my fragile mental state or anything. Plus I have some really good noise-cancelling headphones so feel free to shove a sock on your door-handle or whatever, any time you’re getting lucky.” Jisoo grins boyishly at her, blissfully unaware of how her words are kicking Jennie in the heart.  
  
She scratches at the handle of her mug with her thumbnail. “I’ll, uh. Bear that in mind.”  
  
Jisoo sits back, satisfied. “Soul mark, huh? You’re a believer?”  
  
“Yes.” Jennie nods fervently, because she is. Even if it’s really fucking hard sometimes, she still believes. She feels the words _because it’s you_ bubble up from her chest and sit on her tongue, waiting to be set free. She swallows them down. She would hate for Jisoo to think she’s been trying to take advantage of her while she’s been vulnerable, when all she wants is for Jisoo to be happy. Instead she says, “Why aren’t you?”  
  
Jisoo fidgets her toes so they’re tucked warm beneath Jennie’s thigh. “My mom and dad were soul-matches. They were… god, so happy. Perfect couple.” Jisoo’s eyes flash golden in the lamplight. “But then she died, and… My dad didn’t know how to carry on without her. It was like he needed his soul-match to survive, and no-one else was worth living for. Not even his kids.” She bites her lip. “He drank himself stupid every night. He's stopped now, but. It tore me up, as a kid. I needed him, and he wasn’t there, you know? I guess I don’t… I don’t like the idea that a soul-match ruins everyone else for you. The idea that there’s just one person out there for me… That’s… That’s just scary. There’s nothing romantic or reassuring about that, to me.”  
  
Jennie can certainly understand that, even if she doesn’t feel the same way. “I’m sorry.”  
  
Jisoo shrugs. “It’s alright. Anyway, why do I even need a soul-match when I have you, my biggest buddy and roommate extraordinaire who happens to make the very best ramen in all the world?” She sends a hopeful smile in Jennie’s direction. Jennie gives in and makes ramen, and Jisoo eats way more than her fair share. Jennie pretends to grumble about it, and eventually Jisoo falls asleep with her feet in Jennie’s lap.  
  
Jennie sits for a long time, perfectly still, watching as the light from the setting sun turns Jisoo's pale skin golden and pink and orange and picks out strands of purple in her hair. Of course she still believes.  
  
Maybe Jisoo will never love her like she loves Jisoo. Maybe that's okay, as long as she's still meant to be part of Jisoo's life - and she believes that she is.  
  
She doesn't know why the mysterious force that brought them together would set it up this way, and yeah, if she's honest with herself, it really hurts sometimes, to live like this. She's worried about the future; she doesn't know if she can do this forever. But right now Jisoo needs her, and she needs her to be her friend, so that's exactly what Jennie is determined to be. And all the while, deep down, in the private, locked-up sanctuary of her heart, Jennie believes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lmao imagine Jennie wearing a tight Little Mermaid shirt just to piss Jisoo off kcsrvft I can't see it happening (cough whipped cough) but in this scenario it's so real though ugh
> 
> Also, quick reminder that this is a conversion fic and you can find the original at http://archiveofourown.org/works/11600508 if you wanna :)


	4. Doubt

Living with Jisoo is beautiful, blissful torture.  
  
As a roommate, Jisoo is loud and eats all the food, and Jennie has no idea how one relatively short and slender person could possibly use that many towels in a day.  
  
She’s sarcastic all the time, she makes up weird words and songs (that Jennie absolutely does not enjoy at all), and she has an Instagram account dedicated to memes she makes out of Jennie’s candids. She and Lisa try in vain to engage Jennie in a prank war but don’t seem to realise how massively unsubtle they both are, and always manage to give themselves away somehow (their attempts, however, result in a great deal of fodder for the Instagram account).  
  
Most heinously of all: she's stolen Jennie’s fucking pretzel pajamas.  
  
She’s basically everything Jennie never wanted in a roommate, and Jennie loves her.  
  
She’s adorably undone first thing in the morning, stumbling around the kitchen bleary-eyed until Jennie presses a mug of hot chocolate into her hands. Once the sugar kicks in, she loves to make Jennie breakfast, setting huge stacks of pancakes or waffles in front of her despite Jennie’s half-hearted protests. After a few weeks, she starts to arrange fruit in obnoxious (and often obscene) pictures on the plate in an effort to see how hard she can make Jennie roll her eyes.  
  
Once a suitable quantity of carbs and sugars have been consumed, Jisoo disappears to shower (which Jennie never thinks about ever), and then reappears before leaving for work. She dresses herself pretty neatly and professionally, considering the amount of oversized black shirts she owns, but sometimes she feels like pulling jokes just to induce a heart attack to Jennie’s fashionista soul.

One time Jisoo showed up wearing a bright orange bow-tie and Jennie didn’t speak to her the whole day. As Jisoo doesn’t have a set schedule she usually shows up at the studio, and that time was no different. The teasing only increased when she noticed how Jennie was hiding a smile behind her stare of judgement, and the bow-ties became a recurring joke. ‘The bow-ties are retina-searingly awful’, Jennie points out, but Jisoo just grins, and Jennie tries to ignore the fact that she must be really far gone for this girl if she thinks she's sexy even in a blue bow-tie with gummy bears on it. She knows Jisoo takes it off as soon she leaves, but Jennie supposes she might have a soft spot for the way the bow-ties are a testament to Jisoo’s endearing nerdiness. Although it’s probably more the fact that the woman she loves likes to make a show of appearing in front of her literally wrapped in a bow.  
  
And yet Jennie isn’t able to touch her. Her fucking _life_ , man.  
  
Happily – or not, Jennie can’t decide – Jisoo seems to have no such reservations about touching _her_.  
  
Although Jisoo isn't much of the skinship type, every now and then there are hugs and back-pats and shoulder squeezes, and even companionable slaps on the butt which make Jennie yelp and glower even though secretly her stupid, traitorous heart leaps a little every time.  
  
As the summer melts away into fall, Jisoo gets so comfortable around Jennie she even starts dropping down into Jennie’s lap any time there aren’t enough chairs for everyone. No one else seems to think this is weird because they're quite a touchy-feely group, and Jennie has no idea what is a normal amount of touching for two extremely platonic roommates.

She deals with being Jisoo’s human chair pretty well, she thinks, except for that one time Jisoo was playing Mario Kart and she kept shifting her body weight to lean into the bends, and Jennie had to think about her grandmother in a Shrek costume to keep her sanity.

So at some point – specifically, at 7:22AM of a Monday, when Jisoo had spent twenty minutes trying to wake up an exceptionally more-than-usual grumpy Jennie – she stops being the one that simply goes with it while carefully keeping her hands to herself and starts being the one who actively seeks out affection, earning herself the righteous nickname of ‘Jendeuk’.  
  
Jisoo still has low moments, usually when she hears her and Seulgi’s special song or a movie they both loved comes on (and on those days Jennie knows it’s best to feed her a lot of pizza and watch animes with her until she falls asleep) but generally speaking, she's doing much, much better.  
  
Jennie is both incredibly proud and incredibly scared, because she knows that the better Jisoo feels, the closer she is to maybe wanting to start dating again, and Jennie’s not at all sure that it won’t crush her. In the quiet solitude of her room, she sketches some of the little, perfect moments of her life, and tucks them away safely in a box she keeps under the bed. She doesn’t know if, when Jisoo is gone, she’ll ever be able to look at them again, but at least she’ll know they’re still there. They’ll never be lost to her completely.  
  
*  
  
“Oh my god,” Jisoo’s voice is muffled through her forearm as she slumps despondently over the table. “I’m gonna be single forever…”  
  
“What’s going on?” Jennie asks, breathless and buzzing from her work out. It’s a glorious October Sunday morning, all birdsong and good feels. She heads straight for the fridge to grab a bottle of water, smiling when she sees a big bowl of fresh, chopped fruit waiting there. She grabs a hunk of watermelon and bites into it, enjoying the cold sweetness of it on her tongue. It’s these sorts of little, thoughtful gestures that keep Jennie from strangling Jisoo when she finds she's saran-wrapped the entire bath tub when Jennie has been at the studio working late.  
  
“Jisoo struck out at the grocery store,” Bobby smirks.  
  
The watermelon turns sour in Jennie’s mouth.  
  
“Thank you, Bobby, for your unwavering support, as ever.” Disdain is practically dripping from Jisoo’s pores.  
  
“You’re welcome,” Bobby sing-songs, unperturbed.  
  
Beneath all the snark, Jennie thinks that Bobby and Jisoo do sort of grudgingly like each other, but there’s no way either of them would ever admit it.  
  
Jisoo doesn’t move from her hunched-over position, but does raise one hand to flip Bobby off.  
  
Bobby curls his lip a little. “Fine. How about this… I will personally make sure you don’t end up old and alone.”  
  
Jisoo shifts enough that one eye peers suspiciously through the tangle of her forearms. “How?”  
  
“I’ll make you a deal, Kim.” Bobby tilts his head, suddenly serious. “How about, if we both are single at forty-five…”  
  
Jisoo lifts her head fully then, to stare at Bobby in shocked anticipation, and Jennie does the same because Bobby is the very last person Jennie had ever expected a marriage pact from.  
  
“…I will kill you.” Bobby finishes, stretching his arms up above his head casually. “So at least you’ll never be old.”  
  
Ah. Well that figures.  
  
Jisoo glares. “You are an epic asshole, Kim Jiwon. Seriously, if there were an asshole Olympics you’d win gold, silver and bronze.”  
  
“Aww, thanks, man.” Bobby makes a ridiculous kissy face that only serves to incense Jisoo further.  
  
Jennie shakes her head and wanders to her room to take a shower. While the water heats up she gives herself a little pep talk in the mirror about keeping her shit together around Jisoo. It’s not like she hadn’t been expecting the dating thing, and it’s not like Jisoo even seems to be all that good at it, so maybe she shouldn’t worry about it too much yet.  
  
Just before stripping off her sports bra she stops suddenly, sniffing the air. The whole bathroom smells suspiciously of… soup? What the…?  
  
A brief investigation yields the bouillon cube that someone must have hidden in the showerhead – definitely Jisoo, judging by the guilty blush that stains her cheeks when a distinctly un-soupy Jennie re-appears in the kitchen.  
  
She rummages under the kitchen sink for the bottle of bathroom cleaner, and then turns back to Jisoo to lecture her silently with her eyes, only to find she already seems to feel pretty bad about this one because she's gone way more pink and fluttery than she usually gets.  
  
“Did you, uh, get more ink?” The deflection sounds jittery, so she must be expecting Jennie to be mad.  
  
“Jiyong did some more of the shading, yeah.” Jennie glances down at her left ribcage, from where the vibrant splashes of her most recent piece pokes its way underneath her sports bra. Jiyong has recently developed a taste for watercolor and Jennie agreed on being his experiment, which resulted in an intricate colorful tattoo of the silhouette of a unicorn with its front paws raised up high. Jennie had forgotten that Jisoo wouldn’t have seen the new work, along with the outlines of a wolf in her shoulder-blade, since it's usually covered by much larger pieces of clothing. Her only visible tattoo is also her favorite – the silhouetted tree line encircling her left wrist, taken from a photograph of the preserve where her family resides back in Gwacheon, because it reminds her of home.  
  
“Looks good.” Something sounds a little off in Jisoo’s voice, but before Jennie can figure it out they’re interrupted.  
  
“I know, right?” The sound of Bobby’s glee filters through from the next room. It sounds like he's relaying Jisoo’s terrible morning to someone on the phone. “And then, no, wait, this is the best part, then she said,” he appears in the doorway and changes his voice a little in a poor imitation of Jisoo, “hey, is your name Google, ‘cos you got everything I’m searching for…” Bobby descends into helpless hoots and cackles.  
  
Jisoo’s cheeks are flaming as she mutters, sullenly, “Doesn’t even sound like me…”  
  
“Don’t worry about it…” Jennie hesitantly reaches out to squeeze Jisoo's shoulder as she passes. It’s not rare for her to initiate contact, but she usually refrains from using it as a form of comfort because her self-awareness makes her go all Jisoo-stupid, and, true to form, her heart rate rockets just at the feel of the curve of Jisoo’s collarbone under her fingers. Jisoo turns her head to look at her in surprise. “You’re just a little rusty. You’ll get there.”  
  
“Yeah?” Jisoo brightens up, the familiar smile that plays around the corners of her lips firmly back in place. “Can I practice on you?”  
  
“Absolutely not.” Jennie makes for the relative safety of her bathroom, bathroom cleaner in hand.  
  
“Aww, come on, Jen!” Jisoo calls after her. “Ooh I got the perfect one! Hey, Jennie, did you sit in a pile of sugar? ‘Cos you have a pretty sweet ass!”  
  
“Fuck off, Jisoo!” Jennie calls back, but she can’t hold back a grin, because yeah, Jisoo isn’t turning into some lean, mean, dating machine any time soon.  
  
*  
  
“So, how’d you do?” Jisoo bounces her knees excitedly.  
  
“I’m not telling you that.” Jennie doesn’t know how she let herself get dragged along to this, only that she’d been watching tv after work then suddenly Jisoo was really close to her on the sofa, wearing this soft gray shirt with thumbholes, and she’d smelled insanely good, and when Jennie had looked up to meet her eyes they had been all lit up, and now… Now she's having a stiff drink after an evening of extremely awkward speed dating, which Jisoo had forced her to come to in the interest of ‘getting her game back’.  
  
Jennie knocks back a good mouthful of cocktail, relishing the slow burn down her throat.  
  
“Come on, Jen.” Jisoo looks a little flushed, Jennie notices – maybe from the alcohol, maybe from being annoyed with Jennie. “How many matches did you get?” Jisoo holds out an expectant hand.  
  
“I’m not showing you.” Jennie tips back a little more cocktail.  
  
Jisoo sighs, exasperated. “Of course you are, you’re a terrible judge of character and I need to vet them!”  
  
“I am not a terrible judge of character!” Jennie huffs, affronted.  
  
“Yeah, no, you completely suck. Just awful. So gimme!” Jisoo waggles her fingers impatiently.  
  
Jennie sighs and hands over the piece of white card. “Fine.”  
  
Jisoo scans the card, muttering to herself. “Alright, so… Woah, a shit-ton of people crossed your box. Not really surprising, you’re hot like burning.”  
  
Jennie kicks at her from her bar stool. “Shut up.”  
  
Jisoo just grins and moves her legs out of the way. “You really need to learn how to take a compliment. You’re almost as bad at it as you are at judging people’s characters…”  
  
Jennie kicks her harder but Jisoo dodges again, and laughs. “Alright so whose box did you cross? Let me get a look at the contenders for the next Mr or Mrs Kim Jennie!”  
  
Jennie glowers and gestures to the bartender that she’d like another very large cocktail.  
  
“Let’s see what you got, big girl…” Jisoo furrows her brow which is so adorable it makes Jennie’s chest hurt. “Oh boy. Okay, Eunbi was hella intense about the wicca thing, and you don’t really strike me as the type to want to dance skyclad around a freshwater spring on the full moon, so no. Kwangmin… Cute, but way too attached to his twin brother… And Hwayoung…” Jisoo winces. “Just, yikes.”  
  
“Yikes?”  
  
Jisoo stares at her. “You seriously didn’t notice she was batcrap crazy?”  
  
“Um. No?” Jennie thought she’d seemed nice, actually, and a lot more down to earth than some of the other people who were so uncomfortable in their too-tight space and too-tight faces. Now that she thinks about it, maybe she had been a little over-familiar, leaning a little too far into her space, her smile a little too wide.  
  
“Damn, you have like no cray-dar.” Jisoo shakes her head despairingly.  
  
Jennie snorts. “Explains a lot about why you’re still living in my loft…”  
  
“Hey,” Jisoo pouts, “You love me and you know it!”  
  
Jennie wants to come back with something sarcastic like she usually does, but her mind goes completely blank. Maybe it’s the alcohol, or that the lights are low and soft, making it all too easy to imagine that she and Jisoo are on a level far more intimate than they actually are. Maybe it’s because of the raw emotion that watching Jisoo chat and flirt with other people has brought to the surface, even though Jisoo thankfully didn’t connect enough with anyone to make a match. Whatever it is, instead of speaking, Jennie just stares at Jisoo like an idiot for a long enough moment that it gets awkward.  
  
“So,” she clears her throat, looking away sharply to snap herself out of it. “That’s a hard pass on all of them?”  
  
“Yeah, Jennie.” Jisoo’s face is inscrutable but her voice is all fond exasperation. “It’s a ‘no’, ‘fuck no’, and a ‘run like hell’.”  
  
“Great.” Jennie downs the last of her drink. She feels fuzzy around the edges, so she definitely can’t have any more to drink. “Can I go home and finish my show now?”  
  
Jisoo glances over at her. “You’ll never meet your soul match if you stay home all the time. They might be right here in this bar, you never know.”  
  
Jennie rolls her eyes. “I think I’ll take my chances.”  
  
Jisoo sighs. “Come on then, you big anti-social lug.”  
  
“I’m not anti-social,” Jennie grumbles, “I just really don’t like people.”  
  
“Pretty sure that’s the definition of anti-social, Jennie.” Jisoo slips off her barstool and Jennie is suddenly so overwhelmed by the urge to slip an arm around her waist and tuck her hand in her pocket that she gets lightheaded and wow, she should definitely not drink any more.  
  
She follows Jisoo out onto the street, grateful that at least, even if they’re not together, they get to go home together.  
  
*  
  
It can’t last.  
  
Jisoo starts to go back out to clubs with Lisa and Chaeyoung and the guys. Sometimes Jennie goes along, although she's careful never to let herself get drunk and she never, ever dances with Jisoo.  
  
One night, Jisoo finds her at the bar, two new people in tow. “Hey Jendeuk, there you are!” she's loose-limbed and tipsily gorgeous. “I want you to meet my new friends! This is Jinyoung…” Jennie nods a greeting to the tall guy tucking Jisoo into his side. “And this,” Jisoo slings her other arm around the neck of a tall, dark-eyed guy in a deep v neck top, “is Jaebum.”  
  
Jaebum flashes a flawless, toothy grin at Jennie. “Hi, how are you?” Something about the way Jaebum’s gaze moves over her, slow and lazy, makes Jennie prickle with self-consciousness.  
  
“Jaebum’s a computer programmer, and…” she pauses to give Jennie a significant look which Jennie doesn’t understand, “He’s currently single. I’m gonna leave you guys to chat.” Jisoo beams at them both and then disappears, which is a little weird because Jisoo rarely leaves Jennie alone with new people for fear she might accidentally make them cry.  
  
Jennie grips her bottle of beer so tightly she thinks she might crush it. She sets it down on the bar, a little too hard.  
  
“Sorry to railroad you like this,” Jaebum smiles up at her, and he's nice enough, Jennie supposes, but she's too confused by Jisoo’s behaviour to really be able to concentrate. “Your cute friend likes my cute friend, so… here we are.”  
  
And _there_ it is. Jisoo wants Jennie to occupy Jaebum while she puts the moves on Jinyoung. Jennie presses her fingers into her temples. Fuck. It’s not like it’s an unusual thing to do when you're out with friends – and maybe Jennie wouldn’t have minded if it seemed like Jisoo gave a shit about whether she’d actually like Jaebum or not – but _this_? Being reduced to a walking, talking distraction? This fucking sucks.  
  
“Gotta say, it works out for me,” Jaebum blinks up at Jennie through his eyelashes. “I’ve been watching you all night.”  
  
Out of the corner of her eye, Jennie can see Jisoo leaning close to Jinyoung, watches how he smiles as his fingers curl around her shoulder, pressing into the fabric that sits right over the dog she put there.  
  
“Right. Yeah.” Jennie stands up abruptly. “This isn’t going to happen. Sorry.”  
  
She blindly makes for the exit, shouldering people out of the way. She doesn’t look back at Jaebum and she doesn’t look back at Jisoo. The heat inside the club is oppressive, smothering. She needs to be out.  
  
The air outside is cool, kissing at her face softly and telling her it’ll be okay, but her cheeks still burn. Maybe that oppressive heat is actually within her.  
  
Her blood is rushing so loudly in her ears she doesn’t hear the rapid footsteps that scuff along the sidewalk behind her.  
  
“Jennie! Hey, Jennie!”  
  
Long fingers at her elbow make her spin around. Jisoo is there, breathless from chasing her, red creeping up her neck from beneath her shirt. “What the hell, you’re just gonna run away and not tell anyone?”  
  
“You seemed a little busy.” she tries hard to keep the bitterness out of her voice, she really does, but she's not sure how successful she is.  
  
Jisoo frowns. “Did Jaebum do something? If he upset you I’ll fucking kill him…” she moves to stride back towards the club.  
  
“No, _you_ upset me, Jisoo!”  
  
Jisoo reels back like she's been struck. “What? What do you mean?”  
  
Jennie crosses her arms protectively in front of her chest. “I’m not stupid. You were pimping me out to get what you wanted. It was a dick move.”  
  
Jisoo looks stricken. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean… I just, I really liked him, and I thought Jaebum was cute and maybe you’d…” she sighs and pushes her fingers through her hair. “Fuck. I’m sorry.”  
  
Jennie shrugs. The hurt tastes bitter and metallic in her mouth. “It doesn’t matter.”  
  
“Of course it matters,” Jisoo says, reaching out to lay a hand on Jennie’s shoulder, right where it curves up to meet her neck. “If you’re upset about it, it matters.”  
  
Jennie gives in. She's confused and a little wounded, but she's not sure if she has any good reason to be, and she feels really, really stupid. And anyway, Jisoo is her weakness. She can’t deny her anything, even if it’s someone else. “I’m just tired. I’m gonna go home, go to bed. I’ll be fine in the morning.”  
  
“...Okay. You want me to come with you?”  
  
It’s so very tempting to say yes, to go back with Jisoo to the home that they share and keep her all for her own. But it wouldn’t be fair. It isn’t Jisoo’s fault that Jennie is six feet of simmering jealousy. “No. Go get back to your man.” She manages to smile enough that she almost convinces herself.  
  
Jisoo hesitates. “Are you sure we’re okay?"  
  
“Yeah. Always.”  
  
Jisoo squeezes her neck. Jennie fights to keep from leaning into the touch that all too soon is gone.  
  
When Jennie gets back to the loft, she slips into Jisoo's room and grabs her noise-cancelling headphones. She puts them firmly over her ears as she lays down onto her pillows, letting the unnatural silence fill her head. She doesn’t sleep at all, but she also doesn’t permit herself to open her eyes, and in the morning she doesn’t look at the sock that hangs from Jisoo’s door handle, signalling a victory for Jisoo and a loss for Jennie. As she pours herself juice, there’s the muted sound of an unmistakably male voice from Jisoo’s room, laughter and low moans. Jennie crushes the headphones back onto her head and flees.  
  
She runs for hours, pounding the streets until her lungs burn. By the time she gets back, the sock has disappeared and so has Jinyoung. Jisoo doesn’t mention him, and neither does Jennie, although she does have to keep averting her eyes from the half-moon shaped bruise just below Jisoo’s ear.  
  
She doesn’t know how many nights like that she could take, even for Jisoo’s sake.  
  
She fervently hopes it was a one-night thing.  
  
*  
  
It wasn’t.  
  
Jinyoung becomes a regular feature in Jisoo’s, and therefore Jennie’s, life.  
  
He’s nice enough, at least. He's uncomplicated and fierce in a way Jennie can respect, which is annoying because Jennie can’t even secretly despise him like she wants to. He's good for Jisoo, she grudgingly admits to herself. He wouldn't know a mind-game if it bit him on the ass, and that’s exactly what Jisoo needs right now.  
  
But the knowledge that what Jisoo needs right now is not Jennie, sits heavy and jagged in the pit of Jennie’s stomach, and as she lugs it around with her day after day it cuts and wears away at her insides until she's a mess of stinging exhaustion.  
  
They hardly see each other for days; if Jisoo and Jinyoung are home Jennie does her best not to be, or Jisoo is out, leaving the apartment far emptier than it ever felt before.  
  
Jennie is tired and miserable, and the worst part is that Jisoo is too busy to even notice.  
  
Jennie’s inscrutable by nature, but still. Jisoo is supposed to be her soul-match, the person who best understands Jennie and she just… doesn’t.  
  
For the first time, Jennie begins to doubt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen both Jisoo and Bobby are assholes and this is exactly how I imagine their friendship to be like (2ne1 and bb were so close, my heart can't take this lack of winkonpink interactions omg T-T)


	5. Crucible

Jennie decides to go home for Thanksgiving, to let herself find badly needed solace in her mother’s arms. She refuses to think of it as running away, especially since she spends hours running every day just to avoid Jisoo and Jinyoung cuddling and laughing and exchanging syrup-sweet kisses over breakfast.  
  
If anything, it’s to give herself a break from her  _constant_ running.  
  
She clears her schedule for a whole week, and goes home to the preserve.  
  
She knows it was the right decision as soon as she gets out of the car, giving herself a second to lean back against the chassis and let the susurration of the wind through the trees wash over her and sooth her soul. The air is so much sweeter here, she feels she can breathe properly for the first time in weeks – months, maybe.  
  
Her family await her with hard hugs and gentle teasing, and as soon as she steps over the threshold she feels more like herself.  
  
This week away is exactly what she needs.  
  
Her uncle has made about seventeen thousand cookies in his excitement at having the whole family together, so Jennie eats way too many of them and then goes on long hikes with her mom and younger nephew Ji Hoo to burn them off. She plays ridiculous games in front of the fire with her cousin Chaerin, her husband Seunghyun who is a quietly acerbic, funny man whom Jennie likes tremendously, and their two little kids, Ji Hoo and Joon Seo. She lets the familiarity and comfort of their love soak in through her skin, patching up the places where her heart has grown worn.  
  
In the evenings she slips out onto the porch and sketches, or just looks up at the stars, wondering whether the knowledge that Capricorn is up there somewhere, as constant and mysterious as the reflection on her own skin, is a comfort or a curse.  
  
She doesn’t let herself think too much about Jisoo during the day, but in the peace of the evening she finds the low-level yearning ache rises up in her chest again. It’s just that Jisoo would be so perfect, here, she thinks. She can picture her helping her dad in the kitchen or laughing with her mom, picture Jisoo and her autumnal eyes among the tumble of leaves outside, or waking up with Jisoo in the teenage bed where she used to dream of her soul-match. It all still feels so right that it’s hard to let it go, even though she knows Jisoo and Jinyoung had probably planned to spend the week together holed up in the apartment doing god knows what to each other.  
  
The night before Thanksgiving, her mom finds her on the swinging bench on the porch. She hands her a mug of hot tea and settles down beside her under a blanket. As she slips under her arm and leans against her side, she's hit by a wave of nostalgia for how they used to do this when she was a kid, only Jennie had been the one to cuddle into her mom back then. Her long, dark hair smells of the same shampoo, even after all these years.  
  
They sip their tea and sit together in companionable silence for a long time, then her mom says, “So Jisoo, huh?” and Jennie sputters a bit, but isn’t all that surprised. She accepted long ago that her mom has magical powers about this sort of thing.  
  
Eventually she sighs and says, “Yeah. I mean… It’s Jisoo for me. Not me for her.”  
  
Her mom presses in closer. “She’s your soul match?”  
  
Jennie nods.  
  
“Does she know?”  
  
“No. She's seeing someone now anyway, there wouldn’t be any point telling her.”  
  
“The point is that you love her,” she pauses to see if Jennie will correct her. She doesn't. “And right now you love her at the expense of yourself. I know you, Jennie. You’re tired.” She keeps her voice mild, but Jennie can see the worry etched into the fine skin at the corners of her eyes.  
  
“I’m okay,” Jennie protests, but she can hear her own insincerity ringing out like a bell. “She’s been through a rough time. She needs-” she cuts herself off, biting at her own lip. “She needed me.”  
  
Her mother hums in sympathy. “You need to do what’s best for you, too. You can’t go on like this forever.”  
  
Jennie looks up at the glitter of stars across the velvety sky and wonders if there’s any chance that Jisoo is doing the same right now. “She’s important.”  
  
“So are you.” Her mother hugs her tighter. “Come home for Christmas? I want to keep an eye on you.”  
  
“Sure.” Jennie smiles down into the eyes that are just like hers. She doesn't mind her concern, not really. The warmth of it spreads through her chest, like a cocktail. She puts an arm around her shoulders and kicks the swing off a little, wondering, not for the first time, what she would ever do without her.  
  
Thanksgiving dinner is chaotic and fun, even if it feels a little hollow for Jennie, like something necessary is missing. Maybe she just needs to learn to live like this. Nevertheless, after draping a blanket over her parents who have succumbed to the mandatory Thanksgiving nap on the couch, she chases her nephews through the trees, her boots skidding on the fragrant, earthy mulch, and she lets herself feel lucky again.  
  
She ends up going back to the city a night earlier than planned, overcome with uncertainty about what to do about Jisoo. Her mom is right; it can’t go on like this forever. All she knows is that the thought of living with Jisoo indefinitely while she's caught up in other people is unbearable, but the thought of living without her is just as bad.  
  
When she gets back to the apartment the lights are all off and Jisoo’s room is empty. Her heart does a disappointed little dive. She'd been excited to see the idiot after almost a week without her. She must be out with Jinyoung. She doesn't bother with the lights, instead heading straight for her own room. It’s not that late, but she's tired enough to sleep. She dumps her bag and yanks her sweater off, skidding to a halt when she notices the shadowy figure in her bed.  
  
“Jisoo?”  
  
“Hey,” the blanket-swaddled shape murmurs happily, “you’re back!”  
  
Jennie is struck momentarily dumb by how pleased Jisoo sounds to see her, and the fact that she is _in her bed._  
  
Eventually she says, “You know this isn’t your bed, right?” Jennie stands there awkwardly, sweater dangling from her forearms.  
  
“Yeah…” Jisoo’s voice is thick with sleep. “Laundry on mine. Couldn’t be bothered to deal.”  
  
“Oh.” Jennie blinks rapidly into the darkness. “I’ll just… I can sleep on the couch, no worries.”  
  
Jisoo chuffs grumpily. “It’s a big bed, Jen. Shut up and get in.”  
  
“Uh, no, it’s fine. I’ll just…” Jennie takes a step backwards towards the door.  
  
“What, are you worried you won’t be able to keep your hands off my sexy self?” Jisoo chuckles sleepily and pats the bed next to her “Come on, I promise to keep my devastating charm dialled down low. Gotta turn my swag off at night anyway or I wake up covered in devotees, and they take up way too much of my comforter.”  
  
Jennie snorts and slides tentatively into the bed, keeping her jeans and undershirt on and making sure to leave plenty of space between their bodies. “You’re such an ass.”  
  
Jisoo ruins it by turning over to face her, lessening the gap considerably. “Rude. I can’t believe I actually missed your grumpy ass.”  
  
Jisoo’s face is inches from Jennie’s own, her skin opalescent in the sliver of moonlight coming in through the curtains. Jennie’s sure Jisoo must be able to feel the pounding of her heart through the mattress. She frowns as her eyes adjust enough that she can see a familiar logo standing out darkly against Jisoo’s white shirt. “Is this… are you wearing my shirt?”  
  
“Mmhmm.” Jisoo yawns. “Laundry, ‘member?”  
  
Jennie nods, although she's not sure she understands really because she thought Jisoo’s bed was covered in clean laundry. She chalks it up to Jisoo’s innate weirdness. She rests her head on the pillow, letting the seclusion of the darkness seduce her into openly staring at the bold chiaroscuro outline of Jisoo’s pale face and collarbones. She licks her lips. This is not helping at all with her indecision about whether to stay or not. “No Jinyoung tonight?”  
  
She sees Jisoo blink, slowly, a brush of dark lashes shading her cheekbone just for a second. “Nah. We decided we’re better as friends.”  
  
“Oh.” Jennie’s heart does a complicated manoeuvre in her chest. _Thank god_. She fights to sound normal. “Are you okay?”  
  
Jisoo nods a little, and there’s a smile, just a flash of white teeth. “Sure. It was always just a casual thing. M’not sad or anything.”  
  
“That’s good.”  
  
“I think so. It was good to have fun. I mean I’d never been with anyone other than Seulgi. But I think I’m maybe more of a serial monogamist, you know?”  
  
“Yeah. Maybe.”  
  
“Hey, Jennie?” Jisoo snuggles deeper into Jennie’s pillow, her eyes dark and unreadable. “I’m glad you’re home.”  
  
Jennie watches Jisoo’s long, silver fingers go lax in sleep before she whispers, “I’m glad I’m home too.”  
  
She means it. Being with Jisoo is unbearable, but being without her is much, much worse.  
  
*  
  
Jisoo at Christmas-time is just about as horrifying a prospect as Jennie had anticipated. She gets home from work one afternoon to find that there’s been a Christmas tornado in her apartment, with Jisoo at its eye, and every visible surface is strewn with red, green and gold sparkly _stuff_.  
  
Jennie sets her keys into the bowl on the table by the door, only now the usual plain bowl has been replaced by a truly hideous dish in the shape of Santa’s face, it’s lips pulled back into a rictus grin. Jennie eyeballs it suspiciously for a second before slowly turning to face the rest of the living room. She winces as she takes in the gold tinsel tree, prancing reindeer statues and flashing coloured lights that are now everywhere. What the hell… “Oh god…”  
  
“Hey, Jendeuk!” Jisoo bounces into the room and wisely hands Jennie a large glass of eggnog. “I saved the tree decorations so we could trim it together.” Her hair is all over the place, presumably mussed up when Jisoo pulled on the awful knitted Christmas sweater she's currently wearing, and her eyes are burnished bronze in the Christmas lights.  
  
Jennie can’t help but soften. “Fine…” she grumbled, but she rolls her eyes to make sure Jisoo knows she's not going to enjoy it.  
  
She’s rewarded with a sweet smile and a paper bag.  
  
“What’s this…?”  
  
“It’s for you!” Jisoo grins and trots over to the remaining box of decorations, stood near the tree. “You have to be appropriately attired for Christmas merry-making!”  
  
With a horrible, sinking sense of foreboding, Jennie peers into the bag. Every fear is justified when she sees the bright green knitted elf sweater waiting for her. “Hey, Jisoo?”  
  
“Yes, dear?” Jisoo winks obnoxiously and Jennie hates her.  
  
“I’m not wearing this.”  
  
Jisoo gives her a level look. “Jennie. You’re wearing the sweater.”  
  
“Not in a million years.”  
  
“Please?”  
  
_Oh fuck it_. Jennie sighs and tugs her own sweater off so she can put the offending item on. “Fine. But if you take a single picture, you’re dead.”  
  
“Aye aye, Cap'n!” Jisoo nods vigorously, and then stops abruptly and just looks at her.  
  
“What?” Jennie messes with the hem of the sweater self-consciously.  
  
“Um,” Jisoo startles, her neck flushing pink against the white of her snowman sweater. “No, nothing. I’ve just… never seen anyone look actually good in an ugly Christmas sweater before.” It’s mumbled so fast Jennie barely catches it.  
  
Her ears burn. “Shut up,” she huffs, elbowing Jisoo in the side. “And hand me that god-awful light-up star thingy…”  
  
In the end she does actually enjoy trimming the tree with Jisoo, who puts Christmas songs on loudly and insists on shaking her ass all around the apartment while Jennie does most of the work. They finish the cookies Jennie brought back from her family’s house, and then watch It’s A Wonderful Life, which is Jennie’s favorite. Jisoo likes Elf, but Jennie’s not nearly drunk enough for that.  
  
Jennie stretches out on the couch, warm and full of cookies, and lets herself be lulled by the soporific effect of the soft lights and Jisoo’s low-level, snarky commentary, which should by rights be really irritating, but is actually a reassuring reminder that Jisoo is there with her.  
  
The last couple of weeks, since Jennie got home from Gwacheon, have been… nice. Falling back into their old, familiar routine has been as natural and as easy as breathing, but now it feels just a little bit different in a way that Jennie can’t put her finger on. Jisoo seeks Jennie out more eagerly, but there’s an edge of hesitancy to her when they’re together that Jennie doesn’t really understand. Although rarely, Jisoo has never tried to hold herself back when it came to affectionate touches, but lately she's been far more tentative, and she seems to second-guess her own words, which has never been the case before (although Jennie has often wished it were).  
  
It must have to do with Jisoo getting over Jinyoung, Jennie thinks sleepily, eyelids comfortably heavy. “I’m just saying…” Jisoo is saying, somewhere just within the far edge of her consciousness, “Pottersville doesn’t look that bad… Dixieland jazz, jitterbuggers, cocktails… Where do I sign?”  
  
Jisoo doesn’t seem nearly as upset over Jinyoung as Jennie had expected her to be, although she's vague about the reasons behind their break-up.  
  
Maybe, Jennie thinks, as her eyes finally close, she'll never really understand Jisoo the way the soul-match books always say she will.  
  
Hours later she wakes up so slowly she's not even sure if she's really awake or not. Her neck and shoulders feel stiff, because she's somehow slumped over onto her side on the couch, but the rest of her feels floaty and relaxed and… she carefully keeps herself still as she realises that her head has wound up on a pillow on Jisoo’s lap, and that there are long fingers carding through her hair. She's facing away from Jisoo, towards the television, so she can't see Jisoo’s face, but she doesn’t seem to be uncomfortable. She strokes Jennie’s hair gently, each press of the pads of her fingers into Jennie’s scalp sending showers of sensations over Jennie’s skin.  
  
It takes Jennie a full minute to start breathing again. When she does, she weighs up her options: she could go with her first reaction, which is to jump up, ignore any awkwardness, make Jisoo turn off Love Actually and go to start dinner.  
  
Or.  
  
She could stay right where she is, floating in this moment for as long she can, heart thrumming like a hummingbird under her skin, not quite letting herself wake up so Jisoo doesn’t have to stop.  
  
Jisoo pushes her fingers up from the nape of Jennie’s neck, and lets her nails drag just a little as she moves them back down.  
  
Jennie stays.  
  
*  
  
Apparently, Jisoo’s siblings aren’t coming back home for Christmas and she refuses to go to her dad’s alone for more than a couple of hours. Luckily, as it turns out, her father's house isn’t far at all from Jennie’s family’s house, so they both wind up to spending Christmas Eve there. Jisoo makes plans to see her dad in the afternoon on Christmas day, and as her Christmas gift Jennie offers her unprecedented use of the Porsche to make the trip.  
  
She even lets Jisoo drive them both to Gwacheon on Christmas Eve morning, which is worth it for Jisoo’s joyful whoop at the consternation on Bobby’s face as Jisoo blows by him, splashing a puddle (Jennie strongly suspects Jisoo texted Bobby to come to their apartment just to be sure they'd pass him, though Jisoo denies it vociferously).  
  
Jisoo is actually not a terrible driver – or at least she seems to be careful with the Porsche and its back seat filled with brightly wrapped gifts – and Jennie is by default in charge of the music. They bicker for the whole journey. It’s kind of the best.  
  
Jisoo is wowed by the sprawling house, spectacularly lit for Christmas, and she loves the natural wildness of the preserve in winter.  
  
In return, Jennie’s family loves Jisoo. Jennie watches with pleased pride as Jisoo chats with her aunt and Chaerin, and then gives her mom a plant in a pot that her own niece made by hand.  
  
Her mother seems charmed, although Jennie doesn’t miss the curious glances she sends her way.  
  
She tries to tell her with her eyes that she's okay, that everything’s okay.  
  
And it really is, at least for now.  
  
Jisoo slots effortlessly into the landscape of Jennie’s life, just like she'd always known she would.  
  
She has to keep reminding herself, brutally, that it’s not permanent; not real. Next year Jisoo will probably be with someone else.  
  
Jisoo is glorious, which makes it difficult to hold onto reality. Her family likes to tease, and Jisoo is more than down with that, riffing gently off of Jennie’s cousin. She's so gorgeous, laughing in Jennie’s family kitchen, that Jennie can’t even resent being the focus of most of the teasing.  
  
She forgets it entirely when Jisoo sits down with Ji Hoo and Joon Seo and produces a little bowl full of cheerios, and another plant pot. “My mom loved Christmas,” Jisoo says earnestly. “It was her absolute favorite. And she did this with me every year, so I make sure to never forget. But this year I need someone to help me out, do you think you guys could help me?”  
  
The kids nod, faces rapt.  
  
“Awesome!” Jisoo exclaims, grabbing the cheerios. “Now, we’re going to grow some bagels for breakfast.”  
  
“You can’t grow bagels!” Joon Seo protests, eyes comically round.  
  
Jisoo laughs. “Sure you can! These are the seeds, see?”  
  
“Those are cheerios!” Ji Hoo giggles.  
  
“Well sure, that’s what cheerios are… bagel seeds, see? Do you guys not use them to grow bagels?”  
  
“No, we eat them!”  
  
“You eat them? Gross!” The kids fall about laughing at the mock outrage on Jisoo’s face.  
  
Jennie knows that Jisoo has young nephew and niece, of course, but she's never actually seen her with kids before. She's mesmerising, pulling her face into all sorts of expressions to keep their interest, and subtly inserting facts and explanations into seemingly silly activities. Jisoo notices her watching and shoots her a shy smile.  
  
Jennie wants, fiercely, for her to always be here at this kitchen table, playing with her nephews.  
  
She wants fiercely for her to be at this kitchen table playing with  _their own_ kids someday. She swallows as her want overwhelms her. She forces herself to smile back and to exclaim over the pot that her nephews have carefully planted their cheerios in.  
  
She and Jisoo both get pulled away in different directions then; Jennie to help her dad chop wood for the open fireplace and Jisoo to look at a problem with Seunghyun’s laptop, but Jennie is always hyper-aware of Jisoo’s proximity. There’s a low urgency, humming in her skin, to be close to her.  
  
She deliberately sits at the other end of the table to Jisoo at dinner because she's worried that having Jisoo in her family home has cracked open her reserve enough that she might accidentally give herself away.  
  
It’s been years since she's laid awake in her childhood bed on Christmas Eve, but that night she hardly sleeps for thinking about Jisoo in the next room. When her clock ticks over to five thirty she decides enough is enough, and gets up to start putting breakfast together for everyone.  
  
She pulls on her favorite robe and pads downstairs, only to find Jisoo has beaten her to the punch.  
  
Jisoo is standing at the kitchen counter, surrounded by bowls and pans, wearing red plaid pajama pants, a red long sleeved shirt, and thick, soft socks. Jennie wants to take her upstairs, lay her out in her own still-warm bed, and peel every single thing back off her.  
  
“What are you doing?” she asks softly, heading for the coffee machine.  
  
“Making bagels,” Jisoo says, wiping floury hands on a cloth. “I asked your aunt if I could. We gotta have bagels, ya know… for the bagel plant.”  
  
“Oh,” Jennie smiles, heat spreading through her chest at the realisation that Jisoo – who famously wouldn't cook to save her life – has risen early to make breakfast for her family. “Of course. They smell good.”  
  
Jisoo blushes and ducks her head, uncharacteristically shy. “Thanks. And, uh, thanks for inviting me.”  
  
Jennie shrugs. “Used to having you around, I guess.” she fixes Jisoo’s hot chocolate and passes it to her. Jisoo makes an approving noise at the novelty reindeer mug Jennie has selected for her.  
  
They just have enough time to get the bagels out of the oven and arranged on a wooden tree made of pegs that Jisoo places in the pot, before the thundering of little feet on the stairs announces that the kids are up, and therefore soon the rest of the house will be too.  
  
Ji Hoo and Joon Seo are enchanted with the Christmas bagel magic, and then tear off to see if Santa brought their presents, too, and Jennie steals one last long look at Jisoo. Her red shirt sets off the pale skin of her throat, and she's laughing and carefree.  
  
Jennie wants to spend every Christmas morning like this.  
  
Her mother appears, wrapped in a robe, to coo over the bagels, and then Ji Hoo starts to coo over Jisoo’s adorable socks, and the distance between Jennie and Jisoo gets further. And yet… Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, but… Jennie can’t shake the feeling of Jisoo’s eyes on her when she isn't looking, and on the couple of occasions she does catch Jisoo looking, she imagines she sees a strange sort of heat in her gaze, especially after she gets showered and dressed in the deep blue shirt Jisoo bought her for Christmas.  
  
_It’s not real_ , she reminds herself. She's just getting carried away at having Jisoo here, with her family, at Christmas. It’s not real.  
  
She props herself in the doorway to watch the kids open some of their gifts. “The key is not to overwater your bagel seeds,” she hears Jisoo tell her dad earnestly, behind her in the kitchen, “or you end up with a soggy bagel.” She bites back a smile, then turns in surprise when she hears her mom press a wrapped gift into Jisoo’s hands.  
  
“Mrs. Kim!” Jisoo sounds just as surprised as Jennie feels. “You didn’t need to… I didn’t expect…”  
  
"Call me mom” Jennie’s mom says, eyes crinkled in amusement. “Jisoo, it’s Christmas. You’re part of Jennie’s family, so you’re part of ours now, too.” Jisoo looks at her for a long moment and then tears off the gold paper to reveal her own pair of pretzel pajamas, only these ones are red in honor of Christmas. Jisoo’s shoulders shake with laughter. “Like I said… part of the family,” she says, smiling wickedly. “Though now I feel like I should have gotten you bagel pajamas…”  
  
Jisoo laughs and says “Maybe next year?”, making Jennie’s face flood with warmth. “Thank you. These are,” Jisoo says, beaming so widely her cheeks must be sore, “so awesome…”  
  
Her mom steps up on her toes and wraps her up in a firm mom-hug. A complicated hesitation passes over Jisoo’s body as she hugs her carefully back. Jennie realises it must stir up memories of Jisoo’s own mom, and then has to look away from the intensity of the moment.  
  
A few minutes later Jisoo makes her way over to her, gift clutched to her chest. “I guess you can have your pants back…”  
  
Jennie rolls her eyes. “Finally… Thought we’d be fighting over them when we’re old and gray…” she blushes as soon as she realises how she's given away her hopes for them still to be close when they’re old, but when she looks up, Jisoo’s eyes are soft.  
  
“Don’t worry,” Jisoo says, “I’m sure we’ll find lots of other stuff to fight about.”  
  
Jennie’s heart is rabbit fast in her throat, and Jisoo is so close, she could just lean in a little and-  
  
“Um, girls?”  
  
Jennie turns to find Chaerin giving them both a significant look, one hand on her hip. At the sight of their blank stares she sighs, rolls her eyes upwards and says, “Mistletoe…”  
  
“Oh…” Jisoo looks upwards at the pearly white berries among the glossy foliage, strung from the door-frame on white ribbon.  
  
Jennie shuffles awkwardly. “Just ignore her, it’s okay, she-”  
  
Jisoo sighs. “God, it’s fine, shut up!” Then she grabs a handful of Jennie’s shirt and pulls her in, wrapping the other around the nape of Jennie’s neck. For a heart stopping moment Jennie thinks Jisoo is actually going to kiss her, but instead she feels warm lips at the corner of her mouth for half a second, and then she's wrapped in a long, luxurious hug.  
  
“Merry Christmas, Jendeuk,” Jisoo whispers in her ear.  
  
It’s Christmas, so Jennie decides to be bold. She turns her head half an inch and presses a barely-there kiss just under Jisoo’s ear. She doesn't know if Jisoo can feel it or not, but she feels dizzy with daring anyway. “Merry Christmas, Jichu.”  
  
They break apart at the sound of Ji Hoo excitedly greeting a new arrival.  
  
“Holy shit, Nayeon?!” Jennie crosses the kitchen in three strides and throws her arms around her, carelessly spinning them around in delight. It’s been years since she last saw her, but she looks exactly the same.  
  
Nayeon laughs and tucks her head into Jennie’s neck. “Hi… I hope it’s okay I came by, I saw your mom in the grocery store last week and she invited me over…”  
  
“Of course it's okay! It’s good to see you.” Christmas could not get any better, Jennie decides. All her favorite people are here with her, there’s three different kinds of meat roasting in the oven and life is good.  
  
A slight clearing of a throat behind her prompts her into letting go of Nayeon. “Nayeon, this is my friend Jisoo. Jisoo, this is Nayeon, my… ex-girlfriend.” It still feels weird to say it, even though their break up wasn’t at all weird, and she's heard through their friends all about Momo, the new love of her life, who she lives with. She wants to hear all about her, all about what her life is like now. She was her first love, something sweet and pure, and she'll always have a soft spot for her.  
  
“Ex-girlfriend?”  
  
“We were highschool sweethearts,” Nayeon says, holding out a hand to Jisoo.  
  
“Ohh…” Jisoo can’t seem to stop staring at her as she takes it. “Sorry, it’s just, I live with Jennie and she hasn't dated in all the time I’ve known her, so to have proof of actual human relationships is…” she mimes an explosion near her head with her hands and makes a ‘kaboom!’ sort of noise.  
  
Nayeon slips her coat off over her shoulders and accepts Jennie’s aunt offer of tea and one of Jisoo’s bagels. “Still holding out for your soul-match, huh?”  
  
Jennie nods. “Still hoping.”  
  
Jisoo stifles a huffing noise which makes Nayeon tilt her head a little, curiously.  
  
“Jisoo doesn’t believe in soul-matches,” Jennie explains in what she hopes is a steady voice.  
  
“No?”  
  
Jisoo shakes her head.  
  
“Good for you!” Chaerin interjects. “We all think Jennie was fucked up in the head to let Nayeon go. They were insanely perfect together…”  
  
“Is that why you didn’t stay together?” Jisoo asks, “Because of Jennie’s soul mark?”  
  
Nayeon blushes pink. “Jennie left for college. But I always knew about the soul mark, and how much it means to her.”  
  
“Soul match or bust, huh?” Jisoo glances sharply over at Jennie.  
  
Jennie has no idea how to answer that so she just shrugs.  
  
“I don’t believe in that. I…” Jisoo rubs a hand through her hair. “I believe more in love, I guess. I actually had Jennie tattoo over my mark, it’s how we met.”  
  
Jennie can see her mother’s back stiffen and decides to do damage control. “Hey, Nayeon, come and meet my nephews?”  
  
Catching up with Nayeon is so nice that it takes Jennie a while to notice that Jisoo has slipped away.  
  
She reappears a while later and sits for a while, listening to Jennie and Nayeon reminisce about their high school relationship; Jennie’s nervous first kiss, their first date, and what’s happened to each of them since they said goodbye.  
  
Jisoo is uncharacteristically quiet, and picks anxiously at a loose thread on her jeans. Jennie catches her eyes and mouths ‘Okay?’ at her, and Jisoo nods stiffly. “Time to go to my dad’s,” she says with a nervous smile.  
  
Jennie’s heart aches for her. “You want me to come?” she goes to the hall to grab her car keys from her jacket pocket.  
  
“Nah. It’ll be fine. And Nayeon is here, so.” Jisoo stuffs her hands in her jeans pockets. “You stay and catch up. I’ll be back later.”  
  
Jennie frowns. Something feels off. “Okay…”  
  
She wants to hug Jisoo, but after the intensity of the hug they shared in the kitchen it feels weird. Awkward. She remembers how it felt to press a kiss into Jisoo’s skin, and her ears burn.  
  
“See you later!” Jisoo blurts out, and then she scrambles out of the door.  
  
Jennie stares after her for a second. She wonders if kissing Jisoo like that was going too far. Maybe she freaked her out. It didn’t seem like she'd minded in the moment, and after all, Jisoo pulled her in first, but maybe now she's had some time to reflect… she sighs and turns to go back to her family.  
  
She’s probably over-thinking it all. Jisoo is probably just nervous about seeing her dad. It’ll all be alright when she gets back, later.  
  
*  
  
Jisoo makes an effort to seem okay when she gets back from her dad’s, but Jennie knows her too well by now. She decides to wait until they get back to the loft before she tries to talk to her about how it went, but if anything, Jisoo retreats into herself further.  
  
She doesn’t avoid Jennie or does anything very different, it’s just that she's a little subdued – a little sad, somehow. When Jennie tries to ask if she's okay, she avoids Jennie’s eyes and finds a reason to excuse herself from the conversation.  
  
Jennie wonders again if she went too far with the kiss, but then she remembers how Jisoo had kissed her too, just for a second, and the whispered ‘Merry Christmas’ in her ear, and she ends up going around in circles in her own head.  
  
She doesn’t know what to do, other than trust that Jisoo will come to her in her own time.  
  
On New Year’s Eve, Jennie is in her room sketching when there’s a knock at her door.  
  
It’s Jisoo, wearing nice jeans and a dark shirt and an expression of fierce determination. “Wanna go out tonight?”  
  
“Out?”  
  
“Yeah. Let’s go to Heat. Everyone else is going to be there. And I… don’t want to celebrate New Year without you.”  
  
Jennie looks at her messy hair and her dark eyes, and the way she's nervously biting her lower lip. She doesn't really feel like going out to a club – hasn’t since the night Jisoo met Jinyoung – and honestly, a lot of her uncertainty is because she's worried Jisoo is looking to hook up with someone tonight. But she knows how much Jisoo loves to be out among people, how she loves to dance. It feels like Jisoo's flame has been dimmer since Christmas. Jennie would give anything to see it burn again. “Okay.”  
  
*  
  
The club is a crush of people, noise, and heat. Jennie would hate it except it means Jisoo has to stay close, pressed down her side in a solid line of heat. They have to wait for far too long to get drinks and then Jisoo downs hers instantly. Jennie stares at the muscles of her throat as she tips her head back. Jennie looks for a space to wait while Jisoo goes to dance – she's sure she saw Lisa and Chaeyoung in the crowd not long ago, and Jisoo has already been hugged by several happy, sparkly people whom Jennie doesn’t know – but instead Jisoo grabs her wrist.  
  
Her breath ghosts hot over the shell of Jennie’s ear, sending a shiver down her spine. “Dance with me.”  
  
Jennie shakes her head, expecting Jisoo to wander off in search of easier prey like she usually does, but Jisoo stays put, an unusual intensity in her eyes.  
  
“Come on, Jennie. Don’t make me dance alone…” Jisoo tugs at her hand and Jennie allows herself to be pulled along, helpless against the force of nature that is Kim Jisoo on a dance-floor.  
  
Jisoo is flushed under the pulsing lights, her hair curling a little at her damp temples. Her shirt is sticking to her skin, showing off the bra straps on her shoulders and her narrow ribcage. Her lips are bitten red and she has glitter smeared over her cheekbones. Jennie has never seen anything more beautiful in her life.  
  
She lifts her eyes to meet Jisoo’s and realises with a jolt that she's been caught staring. Jisoo stares right back, and then smiles, slow and wicked, as she turns around and grabs for Jennie’s hands to pull her flush against Jisoo’s back. Jennie tries to drop her hands but Jisoo still has hold of her wrists, so she settles them lightly on Jisoo’s hips. She doesn't really know why Jisoo wants to dance with her like this but she supposes it at least gives her the chance to glower away any admirers that might approach her, so maybe Jisoo will go home alone tonight – or just with Jennie, anyway – and will put on her pretzel pyjamas and play Mario Kart with Jennie until they fall asleep on the couch. Maybe Jennie won’t have to block out the noise of someone else touching Jisoo when she can't. Maybe she can save her heart a little, tonight.  
  
Jisoo starts to move, and Jennie can see from the thick fan of lashes over Jisoo’s cheekbones that she's closed her eyes, so for once Jennie loses herself in the music too. She moves slower, steadier and with more purpose than Jisoo, whose movements are always erratic and free. She likes how it feels to have Jisoo enfolded in the loose cradle of her arms and her hips, likes being the solid counterpoint to Jisoo’s unrestrained energy.  
  
She hopes Jisoo can’t feel her thundering heart or the way her hands shake once Jisoo’s shirt rides up and leaves Jennie’s thumbs pressed into soft skin stretched over sharp hip bones. Despite the scant distance Jennie carefully keeps between their pelvises (no thanks to Jisoo, who Jennie would think was purposefully trying to grind back into her if she didn't know better), this is probably the closest she'll ever let herself get, so she drinks in every second, all greed and need and self-control. She tries to commit the way Jisoo’s hair smells to memory, and lets her eyes trace the slow trickle of a droplet of sweat as it makes its way down Jisoo’s neck. She wants to lick it so badly it makes her jaw ache.  
  
She closes her own eyes, then. It’s too much.  
  
After several songs Jisoo turns in the circle of her arms and pokes an accusatory finger into her chest. “You can dance!”  
  
Jennie smirks at her.  
  
“You asshole! You’ve been holding out on me all this time!” Jisoo is smiling too widely to really sound pissed off, and Jennie is acutely aware of the fingertip Jisoo has left pressing into her chest, for much too long. She glances down at it, expecting Jisoo to remove it, but all Jisoo does is flatten her hand so her palm is pressed over Jennie’s... heart.  
  
Jennie feels her ears burn under Jisoo’s touch and warm gaze which travels over her, slow and unabashed and deliberate. She feels the searing heat of Jisoo’s hands on her shoulders, on her breast, on her waist, and then there’s fingers hooking through her belt loops, pulling her in, and Jisoo’s chest is pressed against her own and she feels the brush of eyelashes along her cheekbone.  
  
She slows her dancing down to a gentle sway, in case any sudden movement breaks the spell cast by the dim lights and loud music.  
  
“Jennie…” Jisoo says her name, low and desperate, and then leans in and kisses her.  
  
Jennie is still and stunned for a heartbeat before she kisses back, sliding her hands up to cup Jisoo's jaw. She wants Jisoo so badly, has wanted her for so, so long, that she can't help herself. Jisoo tastes sweet and spicy, like the coca cola she'd had with her rum, and her jaw is soft and strong and perfect under Jennie’s fingers. She licks her way into Jisoo's mouth like they’ve done this a thousand times before.  
  
Only it's not like any kiss she's ever had before. Since the day they met, the way she feels about Jisoo has been a simmering ember that Jennie tries not to feed too much oxygen, so the flame stays low and under control. But this kiss... it's a kiss of fire. The ember bursts into scorching flames that fill her chest and lick their way down her body, following the fiery polychrome hair of her unicorn. All her worries and self-restraint are incinerated as she loses herself in the crucible of the kiss, only aware of Jisoo's hand curled around the nape of Jennie's neck, and the other still gripping at her belt loop and the flesh right above her waistband. She'll have bruises there tomorrow in the shape of Jisoo's fingertips, she thinks, pleased.  
  
Jennie pulls back a little to nip at Jisoo's lower lip, smiling at her gasp, and then she presses kiss after urgent kiss to the swollen flesh. She kisses Jisoo’s cheeks and her nose and her eyelids, kisses along her jaw and the lobes of her ears, kisses her forehead and her temples, chaste or open-mouthed, anything, anywhere she can reach. She kisses Jisoo for all the times she's wanted to kiss her but couldn’t, kisses her for all the times she might not get to, in the future. She tries to press her love and her adoration into Jisoo’s skin through her kisses, wanting to give as much as Jisoo will allow, until they have to separate to breathe. Instead they rest their foreheads together, propping each other up. Doubt takes advantage of the stillness of the moment, creeping in around the edges. Jennie can't bring herself to look at Jisoo's face for fear of what she might see there.  
  
“So…” Jisoo sounds wrecked, and heart-breakingly uncertain. “I guess we need to talk?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nayeon is such good friends with jensoo, I can't believe people never feature her in fics man wyd
> 
> Also, CL and T.O.P are married with children I love this concept
> 
> Again, this fic is a conversion and you can look up the original here -> http://archiveofourown.org/works/11600508
> 
> THEY MADE OUT HOW YALL HOLDING UP?


	6. Choices

Jennie risks slanting a look up at Jisoo, who seems… not exactly happy, though it's hard to get a good read on her under the pulsating lights. She doesn’t seem angry or appalled by Jennie’s passionate response to her kiss, but she's fidgety and her pout is sad. Jennie wonders if she went too far – although, she reminds herself, it was Jisoo who initiated the kiss, and the dancing, and this whole goddamned night. And it’s Jisoo who is gripping onto her still, bony fingers digging fiercely into the meat of Jennie’s shoulder. Yet, she's skittish and uncertain, refusing to fully meet Jennie’s eyes, and that makes worry trickle icily down Jennie’s spine.  
  
She manages a nod. “Yeah. Let’s talk.”  
  
“Not here,” Jisoo says, and Jennie remembers with a strange tilting sensation that they’re still on a dance floor, heaving with bodies. Jisoo is right. This shouldn’t happen here.  
  
“Home?” Maybe some privacy will help settle Jisoo.  
  
An odd shadow crosses Jisoo's face. “Right. Home.”  
  
Jennie’s heart sinks a little further. It’s not like she’d expected Jisoo to throw a parade in celebration of the kiss or anything, but she also hadn’t expected this nervous reserve. Jennie’s used to Jisoo being unapologetically honest and unfiltered, so for her to continue the uncharacteristic evasiveness of the last week even now… it’s weird and it makes Jennie feel wrong-footed.  
  
Jisoo lets go of her long enough to make an abstruse motion towards the exit, and turns to move through the crowd, reaching back tentatively. Jennie grabs at the gesture with both hands and all her hope, and holds on tightly.  
  
She’s not going to risk losing Jisoo now.  
  
There seems to be an unspoken agreement not to bring up the kiss, or any of the potential emotions surrounding it, until they get back to the loft, which leads to a very strange, silent Uber journey with them both trapped awkwardly in a tin can that smells too strongly of air freshener. Jennie’s not actually sure she's ever seen Jisoo be quiet for so long before. Jisoo jiggles her knees incessantly, staring out of the window at the street lights that flicker by. Jennie tamps down on the urge to settle a hand on her knees to try and still them.  
  
It's an unsettling contrast that the kiss, which was so much more than Jennie had ever hoped for, should be followed by this thick, unhappy tension. Oddly, as Jisoo gets more and more agitated, Jennie feels more and more calm and in control.  
  
She wants to tell Jisoo it’ll be okay. She wants to tell her that if it was a mistake on Jisoo's part then yeah, it would suck for a long time, but in the end it would be okay because they’re friends, first and foremost. She wants to tell her that if it wasn’t a mistake – if, for whatever foolhardy, miraculous reason, Jisoo wants her – then that’ll be okay, too (and so much more, of course). She wants to tell her about the soul-mark. She wants to tell her everything. It feels like Jisoo is finally ready to hear it and then… Well, then Jennie finally gets an answer. And then life will go on, and one way or another, it’ll be okay.  
  
There’s nothing she can do, though, except link her fingers more firmly with Jisoo's where they lie intertwined on the seat between them, and try to reassure her with the touch.  
  
They reach the apartment building after what feels like several years of Jennie’s life. She's sure Jisoo must have dug a hole through the car under her nervous feet. It doesn’t bode well for her wooden floors, she thinks with an anticipatory wince.  
  
They squeeze into the little elevator, apologising to each other repeatedly over who’s going to push the button, and Jennie has to suppress a laugh at the importance they’re ascribing to such an inconsequential thing, in an effort to distract themselves from the much bigger, much scarier issue they’re both ignoring for now.  
  
The peaceful sanctity of the loft doesn’t seem to settle Jisoo at all. Jennie stands, arms folded over her chest, watching in bemusement as Jisoo paces all over the place, muttering to herself, getting more worked up by the second.  
  
“Do you want coffee? I could use some hot chocolate. It’s not too late for hot chocolate, right? I mean it probably is but it’s not like we’ll be sleeping tonight now anyway…” she skids to a halt in between the pantry and the mug and glances back over her shoulder at Jennie, wide-eyed. “I did not mean it like that! I didn’t have, uh… I have no expectations or anything, I just meant because, you know, with the talking…”  
  
“Jisoo.” Jennie cuts her off firmly. “No coffee for me, thanks.”  
  
“Okay.” Jisoo's cheeks go a shade more pink. “Yeah.” she looks down at the package of chocolate powder in her hands. “I probably don’t need sugar either.”  
  
“You think?” Jennie smirks.  
  
“Shut up.” Jisoo turns impossibly pinker. Jennie wants to know how low the blush spreads under the black shirt that clings softly to her chest and shoulders.  
  
“Can’t shut up  _and_ talk,” Jennie says dryly. Usually being an asshole needles Jisoo out of whatever hyper-focused rabbit-hole she's going down, and she figures now isn’t the time to change up tried and tested methods.  
  
Jisoo's eyes flash as she snorts. “Please. Like you won’t be using your eyes for ninety per cent of your communication anyway.”  
  
Jennie takes a slow step closer.  
  
Jisoo looks vaguely panicked and sets off in the direction of her bedroom. “Pajamas! I need pajamas. I can’t do thinking all gussied up. I need to be free, Jennie, free to express myself!”  
  
Gussied up? Jennie’s eyebrows slide right up to somewhere by her hairline as she trails Jisoo to the bedroom, leaving several feet of space between them. “You want to put on pajamas to free your thoughts? I guess that depends on where your thoughts are going to be coming from…”  
  
Jisoo stops rummaging in her dresser and reflexively looks down at her lower body, mortification spread across her cheeks and chest in deep red splotches. She sniffs haughtily in Jennie’s direction. “I fucking hate you.”  
  
Jennie smirks. “I’m pretty sure you don’t.”  
  
“Of course I don’t,” Jisoo murmurs, so low Jennie barely hears it. “I-” Jisoo catches herself. “Fuck…” she pulls out the pajamas Jennie’s mom gave her at Christmas and holds them to her chest like a shield and mutters, “I promised myself I wasn’t going to do this…”  
  
“Do what?” Jennie takes a step into Jisoo's room. It’s not as messy as it is to be expected, with video games and books and mangas and clothes shoved in careful organization here and there, and the bed always neat. But there's always one or two things that Jisoo leaves lying around through the loft, and Jennie’s always felt a deep sense of satisfaction when she sees Jisoo's stuff inhabiting the space she owns, draped over the furniture Jennie picked out when she bought the loft. It smells of Jisoo's perfume and shampoo and  _Jisoo_ , layered into the couch and the curtains. It feels safe and warm, like a den. For some reason the thought makes contentment unfurl cozily in Jennie’s stomach.  
  
She moves her gaze from the tidy bedding to find Jisoo glaring at her. “You have ears like a bat, anyone ever tell you that?”  
  
“Do what, Jisoo?” Jennie sighs in exasperation. “Can you just… step away from the pretzel pajamas? Please? So we can talk?”  
  
Jisoo nods jerkily and sets the pyjamas back in the drawer. Jennie can see her agitation in the rapid rise and fall of her chest.  
  
“Hey,” Jennie says softly. “If you don’t want to, that’s fine. I need to talk to you, soon. But if you’re not up for it tonight that's fine. I’ll be here tomorrow, and the day after that.”  
  
Jisoo glares at her sharply. “Can you stop doing that? You’re not helping.”  
  
Jennie sits on the edge of the bed, near the footboard because being anywhere near Jisoo's pillows feels too intimate right now. “You’re going to need to be more specific.”  
  
“Can you stop doing your adorable-asshole thing? Because I’m trying really hard to respect your boundaries and have some self control, and neither of those things are my best things, okay? Like they would not be on my resume under ‘Things Jisoo is Excellent At’. And it’s already all going wrong because I let myself give in and then that kiss was… fuck, Jennie.” Jisoo sounds sort of like she wants to cry as she drops down on the edge of the bed next to Jennie, carefully not touching her.  
  
Jennie tucks a leg up under herself and runs everything through her mind for a moment before she blinks and shakes her head. “Yeah, try being even more specific than that.”  
  
Jisoo's hand inches closer, bridging the space between them. Her fingertips brush over the back of Jennie’s hand tentatively, like a question. Jennie can’t stop her hand from jerking closer to Jisoo's in response. Emboldened, Jisoo gently laces their fingers together. “So here’s the thing…” Jisoo takes a deep breath in and then exhales it, gustily. “I’m in love with you.”  
  
The words shimmer in the air for a long moment before they fade away into silence.  
  
Jennie stares at Jisoo's face, searching for reassurance of her sincerity, even though she knows Jisoo would never joke about this. But still, she thinks wildly, Jisoo could be drunk (though she knows she's not) or possessed (admittedly unlikely) or, or,  _something_. Her blood pounds in her ears. She feels like something hot and tingly has filled her chest and stolen all her air.  
  
“I mean, you knew that, right?” Jisoo asks uncertainly.  
  
“No.” Jennie shakes her head. “Definitely didn't.”  
  
“Oh.” Jisoo twists her fingers anxiously. “I just thought… At Christmas with the mistletoe I was, like, horribly obvious, I thought for sure you at least suspected.”  
  
“No.” Jennie tries to put words together, but can’t make anything fit. “For… long?”  
  
Jisoo opens her mouth then closes it, and swallows. She looks away. “I think so. I don’t know.” she frowns.  

“You don’t know?” 

“So… remember when Jinyoung and I stopped seeing each other?”  
  
“Yeah…” Jennie does remember, extremely well. It was the night she’d come home to find Jisoo in her clothes, in her bed. It’s a moment she often re-lives in glorious technicolor.  
  
Jisoo shifts a little, feeling guilty. “I haven’t really told you the entire truth of what happened there…”  
  
Jennie frowns a little. “Okay…?”  
  
“Uh, after you left to go to Gwacheon, I was worried. You’d seemed sad and I didn’t really get to talk to you about it. I’d gotten half-way through planning this epic Thanksgiving day with just the two of us and hot drinks and tv shows and stuff, and you know, heart-to-heart time? But then you decided to go home instead. Anyway, it was uh, weird here without you.”  
  
Jennie feels a rush of retrospective affection, knowing she hadn’t been forgotten in the run-up to Thanksgiving. “Weird…”  
  
“Weird. Shitty. Um, it’s possible that I…” Jisoo makes a frustrated spiral in the air with her free hand. “It’s possible that I missed you a little.” she ducks her head. “A lot. It’s possible that I talked about you to Jinyoung a bit. Or, you know… A lot. And so I called him the night before you came home to see if he wanted to go get pizza with me, and he was all like, ‘Sounds nice Jisoo but I really think you should stay home and tell your roommate you’re in love with her,’ and I was like, ‘Pshaw, joke’s on you, bro, Jennie’s not even home for two more days, and p.s. you’re ridiculous, I’m obviously not in love with her,’ and he was like ‘If you call me bro ever again I’ll rip your balls off,” and I was like, ‘Yeah, no, that’s fair,’ even though I don't even have balls because I have no idea where that came from, I have literally never called anyone ‘bro’ in my entire life before, except for this one time when I was crossing the road and there was this nun-”  
  
“Jisoo,” Jennie says firmly.  
  
Jisoo blinks. “Right. Right. Okay, so he had just insightfully pointed out that my being latently in love with you was a slight barrier to my relationship with him, and that we should probably just stay friends, and then he hung up and I stared at my phone for thirty minutes because wow, was that ever a wake up call. I mean it's not like I'm not aware of how beautiful you are, and yeah, maybe I'd had a couple of low key fantasies about, like, covering you in whipped cream and licking it off, and this one time I did have a dream we got married, and it was amazing, but... I guess I was in denial or something. I don’t know how he figured it out before I did. I guess I’m not all that subtle…” she reaches out to shove Jennie in the shoulder when she snorts. “Shut up. Anyway, I handled my moment of stunning elucidation like a boss and ended up wandering around the loft all bereft, like, smelling your sweaters and stuff and in the end I went and got in your bed and that was where you embarrassingly found me, dressed in your clothes. God, so mortifying.”  
  
Jennie hums. “No, I thought that was pretty great.”  
  
Jisoo laughs and covers her face with her hands. “Dumbass.”  
  
Jennie reaches over and gently wraps her fingers around Jisoo's wrists, pulling them away from her face. “Why are you so worried?”  
  
Jisoo swallows with an audible click. “Because of Christmas. Because… I think you love me, too.”  
  
“And that’s… bad?” Jennie shakes her head in confusion.  
  
“Yeah.” Jisoo's face crumples. “Because you loved Nayeon, right?”  
  
Jennie’s sure she just got whiplash from the sudden 180. “There’s nothing going on between me and Nayeon, there hasn’t been for years-”  
  
“ _Exactly_! Because even though you loved her and she’s beautiful and lovely and you guys were great together… You still broke up with her for your soul-match. And I love you, and I tried to be selfless or whatever because I know how much your soul mark means to you. I want you to be happy…”  
  
The familiarity of those words is not lost on Jennie, nor their irony, and all she can do is gaze at Jisoo with her heart in her mouth. “Jisoo…”  
  
“But clearly I suck at selflessness and I obviously can’t stay away from you, not if you like me back. But I can’t be some stop-gap thing for you until your soul-match comes along and you leave me…” Jisoo's voice breaks, and so does Jennie’s heart, a little.  
  
“Jisoo.”  
  
“-which is why I thought maybe it’s better if I move out because I can’t really be here with your stupid face, Jennie”  
  
“Jisoo!”  
  
“-and Lisa said I could crash with them until I find a place-”  
  
In the end Jennie stands in front of Jisoo, takes her face in her hands and kisses her quiet. It’s without a doubt her favourite way ever to shut Jisoo up. She intends to use it often. Unless Jisoo kills her for not telling her about the soul-mark sooner, or – worse – rejects her because of it.  
  
“Uh,” Jisoo manages, eloquently.  
  
Jennie knows now is the moment – knows it’s right and necessary and inevitable. After all, every second of her life so far has led her right here. But she's still shaking, a little. “I need to tell you something. Shut up and let me, okay?”  
  
“... ‘Kay.”  
  
She takes a breath and meets Jisoo's gaze. “I love you too. I want you to know that. And I have known that for… a long time.”  
  
Jisoo's eyes narrow. “A long- How long are we talking, here?”  
  
Jennie straightens up, leaving Jisoo sitting on the edge of the bed, and brings her hands to rest at the waistband right above her soul mark. The air in the room feels thick and charged. Unsteadily, she slips the button of her jeans through the button-hole and tugs the waistband down over her hip, revealing the mark.  
  
Jisoo is, predictably, already talking again. “Okay, what is happening here? Because I know I’m not exactly Casanova or anything but even I know that taking your pants off shouldn’t be your first reaction to someone telling you they love- holy shit, what is that?”  
  
Jennie’s heart races, making blood surge through her veins fast enough to make her dizzy, and she steadies her hands against herself. “It’s exactly what it looks like, Jisoo.”  
  
Jisoo slowly leans in closer, curling one hand around Jennie’s hip bone while she traces the mark on Jennie’s thigh with a feather-light fingertip. “Is this… a tattoo? Because I really don’t think that’s funny, Jennie…”  
  
“It’s real.”  
  
“But…” Jisoo sits back far enough to look up at her. “But… It’s…”  
  
“The same as yours.”  
  
Jisoo falls silent as she starts to take in what that means. “Jennie…”  
  
Jennie lets her look at the mark until she starts to feel squirmy with self-consciousness, anxiety snarling up in her stomach. She hikes her pants back up and sits down on the bed before her legs give out. Half a second later she feels the mattress bounce as Jisoo stands.  
  
Jisoo walks to the other side of the room, scrubbing her hands through her hair. It’s several minutes before she says anything, and when she does she sounds  _furious_. “What the  _fuck_ , Jennie? Why would you… Jesus, I would never have…”  
  
 _Never have stayed_ , Jennie thinks miserably.

“I would never have hurt you like that…” Jisoo looks over at her, distraught. “I must have hurt you so much…”  
  
 _Oh_.  
  
“And god, I never would have…” Jisoo waves a hand towards her room, “…with Jinyoung here, in front of you, I…”  
  
“I know.” Jennie moves her head until she snags Jisoo's gaze. “I know you wouldn’t have.”  
  
Jisoo shakes her head rapidly. “Then why the fuck wouldn’t you say something?”  
  
Jennie sighs. “You weren’t doing anything wrong. You didn’t know. And… I wanted you to be happy, too.”  
  
Jisoo slumps down into her desk-chair, exhaling loudly as she goes. Then she groans and presses a hand to her forehead. “Jennie. The tattoo…”  
  
Jennie chews on the inside of her cheek, hoping she can make Jisoo understand. “I know.”  
  
“Oh my god… Are you crazy? I would never have made you do the tattoo, I can’t believe you even did it! I know how you feel about your mark.”  
  
“I thought about telling you that first day. I came really close. But… come on, Jisoo, you didn’t even know me. Are you really telling me there wouldn’t have been a Jisoo-shaped hole in the door two seconds after I’d told you? You wouldn’t just have gone to find another tattoo artist and studiously avoided my part of town for the rest of your life?”  
  
Jisoo's silence tells Jennie she's right.  
  
“Besides, you were with Seulgi so what was the point? When you and Seulgi broke up I was so glad that you came here, that you let me be here for you. I thought if I told you then it would seem like maybe I was trying to take advantage of you at a vulnerable time. And I figured maybe the soul-match thing meant friendship for us, even though I felt differently.”  
  
Jisoo just stares at her, jaw slack. Jennie rubs her palms nervously on her jeans. “But you were never okay enough with the idea of it meaning friendship to date anyone else?”  
  
Jennie shrugs. “Maybe I would have been, in time. If you decided, right here, right now, that you didn’t want this… I’d respect that. And I hope in time I would come to care for someone else. But since you walked into the studio, I… It’s only been you.”  
  
“You didn’t know anything about me.” Jisoo sounds hoarse and exhausted.  
  
“I know that you don’t feel the same as me about soul marks, but I trust this.” she presses her fingers to her mark. “And time with you just… It hasn’t changed my mind. At all.”  
  
Jisoo blinks dazedly and shakes her head a little like she's trying to get everything straight in her mind. “I just can’t believe you put up with all my crap, this year.”  
  
Jennie shakes her head. “Look, I know it comes across as… Masochistic? But it was partly a selfish decision, not to tell you.”  
  
Jisoo looks up at her. “What do you mean?”  
  
“I wanted you to be happy. I still do. I love you, and to me that means that you being happy, with or without me, is more important than anything. But I also wanted…” she trails off, searching for the right words. This is the last secret she needs to tell Jisoo, the last knot in her stomach she needs to unpick. Then she’ll be fully bare in front of her, and the rest will be up to Jisoo.  
  
“What did you want?” Jisoo prompts softly.  
  
“I wanted you to choose me,” Jennie says.  
  
She’s not proud of the words, but letting them out is an unburdening nonetheless. “I knew right off the bat how you felt about soul-matches, and I knew that if I told you… Maybe in the beginning you’d have left, and then as we became closer, maybe you’d have felt some sort of... sense of obligation. I didn’t want that. So I wasn’t honest with you, I… I deceived you because I wanted you to stay with me. Or at least as close to me as you wanted to be, in the hope that one day you might choose me.” she spreads her hands helplessly in front of her. “If you ever did choose me, I wanted to know that it was just because I’m what you want. No other reason. I wanted that. For myself.”  
  
The words ring childishly in her ears, and she looks down at her hands, ears hot, as she waits for Jisoo to call her out for being selfish or a creeper or just plain weird, but then she tips backwards with a yelp when Jisoo barrels into her lap without warning. “I want you,” Jisoo says, pressing sloppy kisses to her mouth. “I want you because I want you. I fucking choose you, Jennie, oh my god. Also, holy shit, that was the most words I’ve heard you say ever.”  
  
Jennie laughs against her lips, the sudden evaporation of months of worry and heartache leaving her light-headed.  
  
“When we tell this story to our friends and family…” Jisoo murmurs into her neck, alternating each word with a nip or a lick, “We’re going to leave out that part, and also the part where my own attempt at selflessness started with sweater-sniffing and ended with me accosting you in a club after like two tortured weeks. Let’s just stick with the version of this story where we continually try to out-noble each other until we couldn’t keep our hands off.”  
  
Jennie hums happily, eyes rolling back a little as Jisoo teeth scrape over her collarbones. “Deal.”  
  
She bites back a noise of protest when Jisoo sits up. “Look, I want you, fuck, I want you. Like right now, in many different ways – in all the ways, actually. But, uh. I want to be sure that you’ll be okay even if I don’t convert to a soul-match believer overnight, even after I’ve re-contextualised our relationship and processed it all. I don’t want to hurt you any more than I already have.”  
  
Jennie puts her hands on either side of Jisoo's waist, holding her where she hovers, straddled over Jennie’s thighs. “Jisoo. I know you. Yes, I felt a connection to you from the first day, but I also  _know_ you. I’m not expecting you to change what you believe, but if you’re half as stubborn about loving me as you are about your soul-mate beliefs, then I feel pretty good about that.” she pauses as Jisoo's face softens into a smile. “Now, I swear to god, if you don’t start taking my clothes off soon I’m going to go to my own room and get started without you because it has been a really long time…”  
  
Jisoo narrows her eyes wickedly. “Well I am curious about your mark, I’ll admit. I think that in the name of research I really ought to get a closer look.” she dips her thumbs under the waistband of Jennie’s underwear and smooths them over the sensitive tendons of Jennie's hips, making her gasp and arch up.  
  
Jennie is acutely aware of exactly how lucky she is as she loses herself to Jisoo's hands and mouth. She whispers dirty-sweet things into her skin, tracing Jennie’s mark with her tongue, and Jennie’s bones dissolve into icy heat, made impossibly hotter in the knowledge that Jisoo is paying attention to the mark solely to show Jennie she's loved.  
  
Afterwards, they arrange themselves more comfortably on Jisoo's pillows and lie tangled up in each other, petting at whatever exposed skin they can reach. Jisoo strokes her fingertips absently over Jennie’s mark. The touch isn’t the electric charge that Jennie has read about, but more a sense of deep contentment, a blissful rightness that washes over her with every brush of Jisoo's skin against her own. She wonders if Jisoo feels anything similar, and if she does, what would she attribute it to, if not the soul mark.  
  
She moves her hand from where it’s slung over Jisoo's waist, reaching up until her palm is splayed over the skin where Jisoo's mark used to be. She’d only ever touched it with gloves on, when she was tattooing it, and hasn’t even looked at it since. She thinks it feels hotter under her hand than normal skin, but she knows she might be willing that to be true.  
  
“Mmm,” Jisoo murmurs, drowsily. “You’re warm.”  
  
Jennie smiles.  
  
“Do you feel anything?” Jisoo blinks open her eyes which are golden in the lamplight. “When you touch it?”  
  
Jennie shrugs a little. “It feels right.”  
  
“Even though it’s covered?”  
  
“I put that on your skin, though. It still means something to me.”  
  
Jisoo sits up a little on one elbow, and dips her head to kiss her. “Good. It means a lot to me, too, that you would honor my choice like that. Hey, what was it like when you first saw me? Fireworks? Choirs of angels? Cavalcades of gilded unicorns waltzing through the cold and lonely corridors of your rotten heart?”  
  
Jennie snorts and shoves her shoulder. “Ass. No.”  
  
“Then what?”  
  
“It wasn’t some big moment. It was… I thought you were beautiful, but it wasn’t like, some big love at first sight moment, it was… familiarity. Certainty. Like, oh, right, of course, it’s you. It’s always going to be you.”  
  
“Oh.” Jisoo scrunches her nose thoughtfully. “That’s sort of exactly how I feel about you now.”  
  
Jennie’s chest aches with how happy she is, in this little bubble with Jisoo. “You’re not moving in with Lisa and Chae, then?”  
  
Jisoo makes a face. “Oh my god, I was freaking out so bad that I’d have to move out. I fucking love… this loft, man.” she laughs when Jennie punches her, then turns serious. “Is this okay? To already be living together? Like, it feels right to me, but, maybe it’s too fast?”  
  
“Feels right to me,” Jennie mirrors, burrowing into a pillow that smells deliciously of Jisoo, then she follows it up with a hopeful, “Kinda like when you touch my mark?”  
  
Jisoo lies back down with a chuckle and moves her hand to resume its gentle caress over Jennie’s mark.  
  
They fall asleep as the first smudgy tendrils of rose and gold appear over the horizon; the first sunrise of a new year.  
  
*  
  
In the end, they don’t end up telling any of their friends that they’re soul-matches. It’s Jennie’s choice. She's always been so private about it that it feels wrong to splash the news around now, but she does let Jisoo tell anyone and everyone that they’re obnoxiously in love. Absolutely no-one is surprised.  
  
Her mom gets choked up when she tells her over the phone, and immediately sends them matching love heart pajama pants. Jennie loathes them passionately, but wears them all the time because  _goddamn it they’re so comfy_.  
  
The one person they do tell about their soul marks is the Sheriff, who is as happy as Jisoo predicted at the news. What’s surprising, though, is how moved Jisoo is by such happiness that her dad feels for her. For the first time, she and her dad sit together and talk about her mom, while Jennie brings them beer and hot chocolate and drops kisses onto Jisoo's head, and later, holds her as her tears soak the pillow. It’s a deeply complex situation, Jennie knows. But somehow it feels like this one connection has given Jisoo a foothold into something that has been insurmountable to her, and for Jisoo, that’s a lot.  
  
Jennie talks with Jisoo about their soul-marks often. Sometimes it's bittersweet, like when Jisoo finds Jennie's dog-eared anthology of poetry with a bookmark in the poem she'd memorised and repeated to herself like a mantra, night after night.  _To love is not to possess_. Jisoo sets the book down with damp eyes and kisses Jennie, slow and deep, like a promise. The discovery of the box of sketches under Jennie's bed is much sweeter, leading to an hour of happy reminiscing about their not-so-very platonic roommate days. Jennie looks at the beautiful curve of Jisoo's heart-shaped smile, and she decides not to tell her that she drew the moments so she'd always have the memory of them, even if Jisoo left. Nothing good would come of Jisoo knowing that.  
  
There are other stumbling blocks, of course. Where Jennie sees evidence of the soul-match bond (like how Jisoo came to her, and not Lisa, after Seulgi), Jisoo sees a nameless serendipity that could affect those without soul-marks just as much. Jennie attributes the deep bliss of shared physical intimacy to their bond, where Jisoo insists she feels the same thing, but it's down to being stupidly in love.  
  
Jennie doesn’t always live up to her promise to be fine with Jisoo not being a believer. Sometimes Jisoo's stubborn refusal to give much credence to their soul-bond stings, especially since her faith in it just grows evermore steadfast.  
  
In return, Jisoo gets annoyed by Jennie’s refusal to acknowledge the possibility that she could find love again should anything happen to Jisoo. “I don’t want that burden, Jennie,” Jisoo says irritably. “It isn’t healthy to be one person’s everything. You need to live with more hope than that.”  
  
Sometimes they fight about it, but it happens less as they grow further into the trust and security that comes with time, and even if they do fight, they come back to each other, and remind each other with kisses that it doesn’t really matter if the mysterious force behind Jennie’s heart is different to the mysterious force behind Jisoo's – or even if it’s all dumb luck. They always choose each other, in the end.  
  
*  
  
On their one year anniversary, Jisoo brings Jennie breakfast in bed, and on the tray is a small, flat box. Jennie opens it to find a sketch of a cat, done in the same style as Jisoo's dog. “I want you to tattoo this on my thigh,” Jisoo says, “exactly where your soul mark is. You'll have to do that magic again, but see? I want its eyes to be just like yours.”  
  
Jennie loves the gesture, and loves that Jisoo wants to put a representation of Jennie back into her skin. She loves the trust that Jisoo has in her, loves making Jisoo's vision come to life and making it as fucking beautiful as she possibly can, to try to do Jisoo justice.  
  
Truthfully, though, she loves the dog, too. She knows Jisoo worries it’s a sore point for Jennie, but actually, it’s not.  
  
She loves the dog that represents Jisoo's personality so well; her inquisitiveness, her intelligence, her mischief. She loves that the soul mark is still there, if only to her own practised eye. It’s there in the broad strokes and the lines of the dog’s form, an indelible skeleton forming the framework for Jisoo's own free will and choices.  
  
And Jennie is one of those choices.  
  
She thinks about the ring box that she’d found tucked away, the last time they’d visited Gwacheon, when she’d blearily mistaken Jisoo's bag for her own in the early hours of the morning. She thinks about the soft look her parents had shared across the breakfast table when she had stumbled down and dropped into Jisoo’s lap instead of bothering to find a chair, and Jisoo had wrapped one hand around her waist and grabbed for the bacon with the other, putting it directly in front of Jennie and earning herself a sleepy kiss.  
  
She glances up from the needle to find Jisoo watching her intently with astute, affectionate eyes.  
  
“I was gonna get Jiyong to do this as a surprise,” Jisoo says, “but when it came down to it, it feels right that you’re the only person to put any marks on my skin.”  
  
Jennie rumbles approvingly, deep in her chest like a cat, which makes Jisoo laugh.  
  
“You wanna get dinner after? We could go to that diner with the wings you like.”  
  
“You asking me on a date?” Jisoo smirks, sparkling delightedly at her, making her flash hot all over.  
  
Jennie ducks her head. It’s embarrassing how flustered Jisoo can make her, even after all this time.  
  
“Of course I’ll go on a date with you,” Jisoo says, low and warm. ”I actually have something I want to ask you.”  
  
Jennie bites her lip to keep from grinning like an idiot. Jisoo would never let her live it down, even though it’s Jisoo's fault because Jisoo chose her.  
  
Jisoo chooses her, over and over.  
  
Yeah.  
  
Kim Jennie is a lucky girl.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ayyyyyy a cute and perfect happy ending, how yall feel? I swear the first time I read this I was so shook I just stared at the ceiling for like a whole hour going over everything in my head. Quixoticity is really talented and I'm glad that this seems to fit jensoo so well. I took off some of the rated parts bc I draw the line at real people's smut, but like Jisoo/Stiles said, "each to their own" :)
> 
> I love how there's the Christmas feeling towards the more uplifting chapters to match this December feeling we're at, and blinks gifting Jisoo with that Santa hat and all sorts of Christmas stuff is so soft and pure aaaaaaaaaaaaaa
> 
> Having Bobby in this fic gave me some ikonpink feels and I just rewatched the video of him teasing Lisa with the ripped paper 500 times and now I'm sad
> 
> Also I tried to include some Winner/Akmu/Lee Hi in it but I didn't find an open so :/
> 
> BPTV IS COMING we're gonna have ot4 and chaennie rising from the dead soon, I'm so excited I even forgave the scam this time (disappointed but not surprised). I just really hope it comes some time this month or at least in the beginning of January, but until then I guess we'll have to quench our thirst with modelpink and chundays and fics hahaha (this is the sound of my tears falling)
> 
> Merry Christmas everyone ^^  
> And happy holidays, if you celebrate something else ♡


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